PESHAWAR, Pakistan — The head of the group behind last month's horrific Pakistani school massacre that left 153 dead said the militants would strike again if the government continued to target its members and their families. "You will forget the Peshawar school attack when you face more deadly attacks," Maulana Fazlullah, the head of Pakistan's Taliban-Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), said in a 12-minute online video statement that came to light Tuesday.
He said that militant attacks would continue if what he termed "detention and house arrest of their women and (the) torture-to-death of their jailed fighters" did not stop. Instead of saying the group regretted the slaughter of scores of innocent schoolchildren in Peshawar's Army Public School on Dec. 16, Fazlullah threatened to target more children of military officials.
"Every action has a reaction. Killing of people or shedding blood is not our wish but if you target our people irrespective of their age, then we would also hit your people. You killed many of our prisoners and remember we would not spare you," he said. "We would target you everywhere and if you found me, don't spare me," he said in the video, during which he appeared to lose his temper, particularly when he talked about detention and house arrest of wives, mothers and daughters of Taliban members or the extrajudicial killings of imprisoned militants.