The rugged border area of northwest Pakistan has long had a reputation for lawlessness and extremists, dubbed “the most dangerous place in the world” by President Barack Obama.
The Pakistani government faces global scrutiny over the existence of al-Qaeda and the Taliban-related groups and moved in 2018 to overhaul the outdated governance of the semi-automated territory. What was known as a federally controlled tribal area, was integrated into the country’s mainstream political and legal frameworks, pledging to advance economically and reduce violence.
Today, this effort is seen as a failure by many people in the region.
Especially after the Taliban returned to power in Afghanistan in 2021, a new wave of terrorism cancelled many of its progress towards stability. According to the international think tank, Economic Peace Institute, Pakistan experienced more than 1,000 deaths nationwide last year, and more than 1,000 deaths nationwide last year. The group ranks Pakistan as one of the countries affected by terrorism, second only to Burkina Faso in Africa.
The troubles in this area have been in effect for over a century and can be traced back to strict colonial laws that were intended to control the population rather than provide it. The ambiguous legal status of the tribal regions and their proximity to Afghanistan also made them geopolitical pawns.
Mergers in underdeveloped regions into neighboring states have not solved a deep-rooted problem, experts say. Deteriorating law and order poses yet another major challenge for a 250 million country tackling economic instability and political turmoil.
Tribal elders and Islamic churches are ongoing as long as they advocate for a reversed merger. This is also a main goal that is one of the region’s biggest sources of anxiety. The Pakistani Taliban had mercilessly attacked security forces in a campaign aimed at overthrowing the government and establishing an Islamic caliphate.
Pakistani leaders “promised development, peace, work and a fair judicial system. Everything that has been denied for decades,” said Noor Islam Safi, an activist from Mohmand, one of seven districts in the tribal region of the British era.
“The promise was empty,” he said he led in mid-January in a protest in Mohmand. “All we have been given is negligence, increased violence and increased despair.”
The former tribal region, covering approximately 10,000 square miles (less than 5% of Pakistan’s land area), is home to over 5 million people and has long been a harsh symbol of terrorism, oppression and neglect.
In 1901, Britain imposed strict frontier laws to curb resistance and buffering Russia’s expansion. Pakistan inherited these regulations when he was born in 1947.
People in the area were denied basic rights and excluded from national governance. They were not given the right to vote in Pakistan elections until 1997. Collective punishment was common. The entire community suffered from the actions of one individual and faced imprisonment, fines, property destruction and asylum.
The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 transformed the region into the setting of Islamic fighters backed by the US, Arab countries and Pakistan, which were fighting Moscow’s troops.
“This border area has long served as a geopolitical chess board, where colonial and colonial power ambitions have influenced Afghanistan, sacrificing communities to reconstruct the world’s geopolitics.”
After the Soviet retreat in 1989, the area descended lawlessly and became a hub for fugitives, criminal networks, weapons and drug smugglers, and ransom-seekers.
Since September 11, 2001, the area has become a hub for extremists, and attacks on New York and the Pentagon have been attacked as US forces in Afghanistan pushed Taliban and Qaeda militants into tribal areas.
Groups like the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, also known as the TTP and the Pakistan Taliban, have moved to establishing control. Such groups provided rudimentary governance while threatening and killing tribal elders who resisted their rule.
Over time, the TTP has expanded its terrorist network across border areas, attacking all over Pakistan, including major cities such as Karachi, and in the international, particularly New York, which attempted to bomb Times Square in 2010.
After a massive operation in tribal areas, the military declared victory over the TTP in 2018. That year, Pakistan’s parliament repealed colonial laws and merged the area with neighboring Khyber Paktanwa province.
But the gap in the integration process is that, according to analysts and political leaders, the region is vulnerable when the Taliban returns to power. The revival of the Taliban gave TTP sanctuaries across Afghanistan’s borders access to highly American-made weapons seized after the collapse of the US-backed Afghan government.
This allowed the Pakistani Taliban to escalate attacks in former tribal regions. Since mid-2021, the majority of the surge in terrorist attacks in Pakistan have been occurring in Khyber Pak Tankwa, with a large concentration of seven former tribal districts, particularly North Waziristan and South Waziristan.
The TTP killed 16 Pakistani soldiers in South Waziristan in December, and Pakistan responded with air strikes within Afghanistan, raising tensions with the Taliban rulers in Kabul.
In the Kram district, 50 miles southeast of Kabul, sectarian violence exacerbated by land conflicts, more than 230 people died last year. Road closures by fighting tribes continue to lock residents into a cycle of violence.
Further north along the Afghan border in Bajaur district, 34 attacks were recorded in 2024, mainly carried out by the Islamic State Khorasan or the local branch of the Islamic State.
In other districts, the TTP and local alliance groups take control and force money from traders.
The new legal framework for former tribal areas has been largely strengthened due to inadequate management capabilities and insufficient number of formal police officers. The region has been promised $563 million in annual development funding, but Pakistan’s economic struggle is causing shortages. Many important services are still underdeveloped or dysfunctional.
“An a rapid merger, not a progressive and thorough process, has failed to replace the governance system that has been operating for over a century,” says Naveed Ahmad Shinwari, a development expert with extensive experience in the region.
While police officers were recruited and the bureau was established, traditional semi-formal police, made up of illiterate individuals representing the tribe, struggled to move into formal structures and became vulnerable to extremist attacks. Although courts exist in several locations, many local officials say security concerns prevent the construction of judicial infrastructure and force residents to travel long distances for justice.
Major initiatives in former tribal regions, including land settlement regulations and infrastructure improvements, are becoming disrupted as part of the Trump administration’s global aid guiding.
The area’s merger initially attracted widespread support among residents eager to equal citizenship, but there has been a great deal of resistance to the changes that followed. Replacing the outdated tribal police and Jirga or councils of tribal elders has prompted deep concerns about the impact on lifestyles that have been around for centuries.
“Our Jirgas were solving cases in months, sometimes days, but Pakistan’s overloaded judiciary takes years,” said Shiraz Ahmed, a remote village resident who traveled 60 miles for a land dispute hearing.
Some groups in former tribal areas are seeking to reverse the merger, but analysts said that doing so would essentially hand over the area to extremist groups.
