WASHINGTON: The United States on Wednesday designated two Pakistan-based groups with links to the Taliban as global terrorist threats. As ‘Specially Designated Global Terrorists’, US citizens are forbidden from associating with the Tariq Gidar Group (TGG) and the Jamaat ul Dawa al-Quran (JDQ). Any assets owned by the groups in places under US jurisdiction will be frozen and US law enforcement will be authorised to investigate their activity.
According to the US State Department, the TGG is linked to the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan – and is based in Darra Adam Khel. The faction, US officials believe, was responsible for the December 2014 massacre at an army-run school in Peshawar that left more than 130 children dead. The TGG is led by Umar Mansoor, who is said to also have ordered the January 2016 attack on a university in Charsadda that left more than 20 dead. The designation also says that the TGG was behind the 2008 kidnapping and beheading of Polish geologist Piotr Stanczak in Attock.
The second group, the JDQ, is said to be based in Peshawar but to have sworn allegiance to the late leader of the Afghan Taliban, Mullah Omar. In addition to this link to the Afghan movement, the State Department says JDQ has alliances with al Qaeda and Lashkar-e-Taiba. Washington blames the group for the 2010 kidnapping of British aid worker Linda Norgrove in Afghanistan. Norgrove died after being wounded in the explosion of a grenade thrown by a US Navy SEAL commando during a failed rescue attempt.
