Overview
- Pakistan’s foreign minister Ishaq Dar told US Secretary of State Marco Rubio that Islamabad welcomes Washington’s sovereign decision to list The Resistance Front as a Foreign Terrorist Organization and Specially Designated Global Terrorist.
- Dar asserted that TRF was dismantled years ago after Pakistani authorities prosecuted, arrested and jailed its members, rejecting any proxy link to Lashkar-e-Taiba.
- The US State Department on July 17 added TRF to its terror designations, citing its claim of responsibility for the April 22 Pahalgam attack that killed 26 civilians.
- India has pressed the UN 1267 Sanctions Committee and FATF since January 2023 to secure a global designation for TRF, emphasizing cross-border terrorist threats from Pakistan.
- Dar’s public shift follows Islamabad’s blocking of TRF’s mention in a UN Security Council press statement condemning the Pahalgam massacre in April.