Military steps up the offensive against the peace-deal flouting Taliban
Pakistan is widening its offensive against Taliban insurgents in the Swat district, dropping helicopter-borne troops into the Peochar valley, one of the bases for Swat Taliban commander Maulana Fazlullah. Pakistan had essentially ceded control of Swat to the Taliban with a peace deal that allowed for the implementation of sharia, or Islamic law, if the Taliban agreed to lay down their arms. They didn’t and instead pushed into surrounding districts close to the capital, Islamabad. After weeks of fighting in the regions surrounding Swat, the Pakistani military appears to have acknowledged that the peace deal is over and has deployed some 15,000 troops to take on the Taliban in Swat itself.