The Dirty Little Secret In Pakistan Is That the Taliban Are Killing Off Unwanted Candidates For Political Office

 Pakistani policemen investigating on the crime scene

The Pakistani media is trying to dodge the bullet....and in fact, they should be taking some lessons from the American MSM on how to totally not cover a situation that doesn't fit with their agenda...but the fact of the matter is that the upcoming Pakistani elections across the country are being manipulated by the Taliban.

Another politician has been assassinated by the Taliban and while we are sure to see more and more as time goes by, just how many of the politicians on the Taliban "list" will either withdraw or seclude themselves and lose any chance of victory?

The story comes from DAWN.

TTP claimed attacks kill ANP candidate in Swat, injure another in Charsadda


PESHAWAR: A candidate for the upcoming elections belonging to the Awami National Party (ANP) , Mukaram Shah, was killed in an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) attack in Swat’s Manglawar area on Sunday whereas another ANP candidate Syed Masoom Shah was injured in a bomb attack near the venue if a party rally in Charsadda.

In the first attack in Swat an apparently remotely-detonated bomb targeted the vehicle of the ANP candidate, Mukaram Shah, in Banjot village of Manglawar area in Swat. The vehicle was destroyed in the blast.

In the second incident another candidate of the ANP, Syed Masoom Shah, was injured along with three other people in a blast that occured near the venue of an ANP rally held in Katozai village in Charsadda’s Shabqadar tehsil.

The candidate was returning from the venue of an ANP rally when the blast occurred according to local police control room sources.

Masoom Shah was also earlier injured in an attack on an ANP rally in Feb 2008.

Proscribed militant organisation Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) militant organisation claimed responsibility for both the remotely-detonated attacks. TTP spokesperson Ehsanullah Ehsan told Dawn.com that the organisation had targeted the candidates due to the secular views of the party.

The Pakistani Taliban had earlier warned of and conducted attacks against secular parties including the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) and ANP.

A candidate belonging to the MQM was killed in Hyderabad last week in an attack claimed by the banned TTP organisation.

Swat valley was ruled by the Pakistani Taliban during a 2007-9 insurgency was cleared out of militancy after the armed forces conducted an operation in the area.

More over two bombs weighing 20 pounds each were defused by security forces in the Bannu district near Peshawar.

In another incident, a bomb planted on a motorcycle was defused near a Frontier Corps (FC) checkpost situated in the Chaman area near the Pak-Afghan border.