Post 2019 Spike in Terrorism: A Threat to Internal Security of Pakistan

Abstract

The post-2019 period is a crucial timeframe in the context of the reappearance of Tehrik -e- Taliban Pakistan (TTP), Islamic State Khorasan (IS-K) and other militant groups and the consequent rise of terrorist incidents in Pakistan. This paper aims to investigate the significant growth of terrorism in Pakistan as a threat to the country's internal security in the aforementioned era. This paper presents the concepts of internal security from the broader perspective of human and state security. The authors employ the situational method of qualitative approach encompassing various events and situations causing the intensity of terrorism in Pakistan in this phase covering two and half years (from January 2020 to June 2022). The concept of internal security is the perception of an act of keeping peace and maintaining law and order within the borders of a sovereign state by upholding the national law and defending against internal security threats. Besides the increasing number of terror attacks and casualties as compared with the previous years, this period is additionally important due to the US withdrawal from Afghanistan and the return of Afghan Taliban to the power corridors of the war-ravaged country, ostensibly with high hopes of controlling terrorism in the region, affecting security situation in Pakistan as well. It has been identified that terrorism in the country during 2020 had increased compared to the year 2019, and there was a sharp rise in 2021 and 2022, reinforcing a threat to the country's internal security.