In the heart of a nation built upon sacrifice, where every inch of soil bears the memory of martyrs, a movement has risen that distorts truth, weaponizes victimhood, and turns patriotism into suspicion. The Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM) claims to speak for the oppressed, yet its words wound deeper than any bullet, and its actions embolden those who seek to fracture Pakistan from within. What began as a call for justice has morphed into an echo chamber of falsehoods — one that betrays not only the state but the very Pashtuns it pretends to defend.
PTM sheds tears over Pashtun suffering, yet desecrates the memory of Pakistan’s martyred soldiers — the very men who laid down their lives so that Pashtuns could live in peace and dignity. Their hypocrisy stands exposed as they wave Afghan flags while benefiting from the security ensured by the blood of Pakistani soldiers. They claim to oppose oppression yet stand shoulder to shoulder with those who harbored the terrorists responsible for the deaths of innocent Pakistanis. Their accusations against Pakistan’s security forces are not cries for justice but echoes of enemy propaganda designed to blur the line between defender and aggressor.
When bombs tore through Pashtun markets and homes, it was not PTM that stood guard. It was the Pakistani soldier — many of them Pashtun by blood, Pakistani by heart — who fought and fell defending his people. PTM’s slogans may be loud, but they are hollow; their venomous speeches can never erase the eternal glory of those who fought terrorism face to face. While the soldier’s sacrifice breathes life into the nation, PTM’s rhetoric seeks to suffocate it with hate.
After Pakistan rebuilt the once-devastated tribal areas, merging FATA with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa to ensure equality, representation, and development, PTM responded not with gratitude but hostility. The government constructed roads, hospitals, and schools; PTM responded with division, venom, and protest. They talk of progress, yet despise the very state that made it possible. Hypocrisy, it seems, never stood taller than this.
The double standards are too glaring to ignore. PTM claims to defend Pashtuns but stands with those who slaughter them. Their solidarity with Afghanistan’s political narratives is not kinship — it is complicity. Their loyalty lies not with Pakistan’s soil but with the narrative that funds them. As Pakistani soldiers bleed on the frontlines, PTM fires words that wound deeper than any weapon. Their noise weakens unity; their lies empower enemies. Yet Pakistan stands firm — because the truth needs no slogan. It lives and breathes in the name of every martyr who fell defending this flag.
Ironically, the same security forces PTM maligns are largely composed of Pashtun sons — guardians of their land, loyal to their soil, defenders of their people. They do not raise foreign flags; they raise the green and white in pride. The difference between loyalty and treachery has never been clearer. PTM weeps for the dead but mocks the defenders. They invoke Pashtunblood yet deny Pakistani identity. Their tears are political; their silence on Afghan-backed terrorism is deafening.
Our enemies may cross borders, but PTM echoes their lies within them. Their slogans divide, their alliances expose them. They talk of rights yet deny Pakistan’s right to defend its own people. Their deceit is not born of ignorance but of intent — intent to fragment a nation built on unity and sacrifice.
The 2024 Pashtun National Jirga (PNJ) exposed this agenda in plain sight. Under the guise of ethnic rights, PTM transformed the Jirga into a propaganda platform — crafting 22 politically motivated demands that directly challenge Pakistan’s sovereignty. Their reckless call for both the army and militants to withdraw from KP would create a power vacuum, handing control back to TTP terrorists. Their demand for “international mediation” in Pakistan’s domestic matters betrays a foreign script, while their insistence on halting counter-terror operations serves as an open invitation for militants to regroup.
Equally alarming is their push to free so-called “missing persons” — many linked to terrorism — without due process, ignoring the countless victims of TTP’s atrocities. By portraying terrorists as victims and soldiers as oppressors, PTM’s jirga parrots the propaganda of Kabul and RAW. Their demand to dismantle security check posts would reopen the floodgates of cross-border infiltration, undoing years of hard-won peace.
PTM’s attempt to discredit the FATA merger and call for tribal “autonomy” plays directly into the militants’ agenda — to keep the region unstable and ungoverned. Their appeal for foreign “monitoring commissions” reveals their intent to internationalize Pakistan’s internal matters, undermining national institutions while conveniently ignoring the real enemy: the TTP. Their push to halt CPEC projects in the name of “environmental protection” exposes another layer of sabotage — to block progress and enable chaos.
Pakistan’s security forces have lost over 94,000 lives in the war against terror — soldiers, citizens, and thousands of Pashtuns among them. To label this as “state aggression” is a moral and factual travesty. The same regions once gripped by TTP brutality now see schools, roads, and markets thriving again because of those sacrifices. PTM’s effort to erase this truth is not activism; it is subversion.
The so-called Pashtun National Jirga is, in essence, PTM’s new mask — a platform to inject foreign narratives under the banner of tribal unity. Its rhetoric of “Pakistan’s war on Pashtuns” is a distortion meant to rewrite history. The TTP enslaved the same people PTM claims to represent, while Pakistan’s military liberated them. To invite “international involvement” in Pakistan’s internal affairs is not advocacy; it is betrayal.
Pakistan’s struggle is not against ethnicity but against terrorism. PTM’s attempt to transform a national security issue into an ethnic grievance is deliberate deception. The people of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa know the truth: Pakistan defends them from terrorists, not from their identity. And still, Pakistan stands — bruised but unbroken, patient yet powerful. For every false slogan, there are a thousand true hearts that beat for the green crescent. PTM’s deceit may darken the air for a while, but the storm of truth will always clear it. The loyalty of this nation runs deep — deeper than their lies, stronger than their propaganda, and eternal as the blood of its martyrs.
