TTP pledges to fight in Kashmir, implement sharia in India

, Jan 8: A top Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (

) leader Wali Ur Rehman in a rare video appearance has pledged to send fighters in

and wage a struggle for implementation of Sharia rule in India.

Wali Ur Rehman, against whom the US has announced USD 5 million reward for his involvement in the murder of seven CIA officials in Afghanistan in Dec 2009, is believed to have said this in a rare video of his along with the TTP chief Hamikullah Mehsud, in which the two militant leaders have for the first time spoken about their ambitions transcending beyond the Af-Pak border taking them to Kashmir, India and the United States as well.

"The practical struggle for a Sharia system that we are carrying out in Pakistan, the same way we will continue it in Kashmir, and the same way we will implement the Sharia system in India too. And this is the only solution for people's problems," said Rehman, according to the translation provided by the Jihad and Terrorism Threat Monitor (JTTM) of Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), a Washington-based think tank. The 45:52 minute video in Pashtu with Urdu subtitles has been produced by Umar Media, the broadcasting arm of TTP. The video is titled as "The False Propaganda of the Dajjali Media Revealed". It was released to internet on Jan 6.

According to MEMRI, for the first time perhaps, TTP's official spokesman Ehsanullah Ihsan is show in the video, which devotes a section –towards the last part -- on Kashmir. Claiming that the Jihad launched by the Pakistani Government inside Kashmir has failed to yield any desired result, the TTP video says that it would launch its own jihad in the Valley and talks about sending its own jihadi forces in the Valley.

"Allah willing, the mujahedeen of Tehreek-e-Taliban will arrive in Kashmir and as per the Islamic sharia will help the Kashmiris get their rights. As our ancestors sacrificed their lives for Kashmir and had got Kashmir liberated by force [in 1947-48], the same way their progenies [i.e. Taliban fighters], walking in the footsteps of their forefathers, will get Kashmir liberated [from India], and will help them get their rights," Rehman said.

"That registered [i.e. government-sponsored] jihad that Pakistan had begun cannot liberate Kashmir, and even if it were to be liberated, it will be for name only, but the system will not change [in favour of Islamic sharia rule] and their fate will not be changed, and if it were to change, only Shari'a system will change it. And it is our promise to those people [in Kashmir] that we will share their grief," the propaganda says as per the translation provided by MEMRI.

"Insofar as Pakistan's dirty policy [on Kashmir] is concerned, as per which Kashmiris have been ruined and destroyed under the pretext of Kashmir policy, their everything has been destroyed, we strongly condemn this policy too as much as we do about India’s atrocities," said Rehman, who has been designated as a terrorist leader by the State Department.

Tufail Ahmed from Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) -- –a Washington-based expert who keeps a tab on the terrorist outfits of the region -- said that this should not be dismissed as a propaganda video in the usual sense of the term propaganda.

PTI