THE killing of the ANP’s district president, Khan Gul Bittani, in Tank on Tuesday is another grim indicator of the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan returning to its tactic of targeted killings of political and community leaders in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and the tribal areas. Late June, the leader of an anti-Taliban laskhar and three of his associates were killed in the Bazid Khel area of Peshawar. Several other similar incidents have occurred in recent weeks. The tactic may be new — or rather a revived one — but the problem is old: the state’s inability to decisively tackle the Taliban threat as it morphs and ebbs and flows. Part of the problem is still the unacceptable level of problems in coordination between the intelligence agencies, security forces and local law-enforcement agencies. The killing of a tribal leader, local politician or leader of an anti-Taliban group on a road or in a bazaar is usually over in the blink of an eye — so what is needed is the intelligence and the resources to find the killers in their hideouts where they plan such attacks.

There is a wider problem though: the absence of a comprehensive strategy to deal with militancy and insurgents. The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government tried to take a longer view on dealing with militancy recently but the paper produced and discussed by the provincial government will require serious implementation — and implementation is where the best laid plans come unstuck. Even the best of intentions sometimes lead to unintended negative consequences. For example, the superior judiciary’s pursuit of missing persons is admirable and deserves the fullest support. But the intelligence and security agencies have been left with a dilemma in the murky world of militancy: continue with business-as-usual tactics and risk the court’s ire or avoid detaining suspected militants until the evidence is overwhelming, and in the process, risk letting the militants carry out more attacks. The solution ought to be that the federal and provincial governments work together to overhaul anti-terrorism laws but the paralysis at both those levels makes such an outcome very unlikely. So on Pakistan muddles through, except that the problems are growing.