Washington: The US might designate several Pakistani-based extremist outfits as Foreign Terrorist Organisation (FTO), so that overseas travel and financial restrictions could be imposed on them.
The US State Department spokesman PJ Crowley said on Wednesday that toping the list would be Pakistani Taliban or the Tehrek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and the Haqqani network. However, he refrained from giving any time-line as to when the sanctions on these organisations would be slapped.
He said the US State Department is evaluating a number of entities in Pakistan and once all legal formalities are met they would come to a decision.
"Obviously there is an impact on any group that is designated as a FTO. It has very definite financial and legal implications. It's one of the reasons why there's a deliberate process involved," Crowley said.
"Whether you're talking about the Haqqani network, whether you're talking about the Pakistani Taliban or any group anywhere in the world, we take this responsibility seriously. We designate individuals and groups on an ongoing basis," Crowley said.
Explaining the possible reasons for the delay in declaring these outfits as FTO, Crowley said these steps have to be carefully evaluated because it does have financial and legal consequences. "Frequently we could be subject to a lawsuit. So we would have to defend a decision that we've made in these designations," he said.
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