As Buner and Lower Dir are cleared of the Taliban invaders and the Government of the NWFP steps up its pressure, there are some reports coming out of Swat that the TNSM Chief Sufi Muhammad is abandoning the peace agreement that he made with the NWFP government because of the military operations and have threatened a resumption of suicide attacks.

Ameer Izzat Khan, spokesman of the Taliban, said that “the TNSM would no longer be responsible for the security of the Malakand division”. He also blamed the NWFP government for violating the peace agreement.

What I find funny is the number of times that the Taliban violated that same peace agreement (the Taliban takeover of Buner & Shangla, sealing the district courts and threatening the lawyers and judges, and the suicide attacks in other parts of the NWFP) with the Government of Pakistan and the NWFP standing firm to their commitments.

Mian Iftikhar Hussain, Information Minister of the NWFP government, said that since the Nizam-e-Adl has been signed, anyone who picks up a weapon is a terrorist.

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