4 May 2010 / REUTERS, ISLAMABAD
The leader of the Pakistani Taliban, Hakimullah Mehsud, reported killed in a CIA drone aircraft attack in January, has appeared in Internet videos threatening revenge suicide strikes in the United States.
Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), the Taliban Movement of Pakistan, has focused on fighting the Islamabad government and has never proved capable of carrying out overseas attacks. Even so, the possibility the TTP may have global aspirations may worry Washington because of the group’s ties with al-Qaeda, which carried out the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks in New York and Washington. The warnings were posted on the Internet shortly after the TTP said it was responsible for an attempted car bomb attack in New York’s Times Square on Saturday evening. “The time is very near when our Fedayeen [fighters prepared to sacrifice themselves] will attack the American states in their major cities,” warned Mehsud, who said the video was recorded on April 4, 2010. “Our Fedayeen have penetrated the terrorist America. We will give extremely painful blows to the fanatic America.” The TTP has proven resilient despite a series of Pakistani army offensives in the northwest, a global militant hub. It has carried out suicide attacks on a wide range of targets -- from military and police facilities to crowded markets. The group surprised observers with its apparent involvement in a suicide bomb attack near Khost in eastern Afghanistan on Dec. 30. That strike killed seven US Central Intelligence Agency employees in the second worst attack in the spy agency’s history.
