By Andrew Quinn
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States on Wednesday formally added the Pakistani Taliban to its list of foreign terrorist organizations, imposing financial and travel sanctions on the group which claimed responsibility for the failed bomb plot in New York's Times Square.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in a statement the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or Taliban Movement of Pakistan, met the criteria to be included on the list, which bars any material support to and freezes the financial assets of groups deemed involved in terrorism.
The TTP is the main Pakistani militant alliance which operates from Pakistan's northwest. It has links with al Qaeda as well as Punjabi militant groups and is suspected of being behind most bomb and suicide attacks across Pakistan.
TTP also claimed responsibility for being behind the botched bomb plot in New York's Times Square in May, an attack which analysts said showed the militant group was seeking to bring its violent campaign to U.S. shores.
More recently, the TTP claimed responsibility for attacks in Lahore in May that killed between 80 and 95 members of the minority Ahmadi sect.
Washington sees Pakistan as a frontline state in its war against the Taliban and al Qaeda and has named a number of Pakistani militant groups to its blacklist, which is aimed at curtailing support for terrorist activities and squeezing them financially.
Clinton's statement listing the TTP as a foreign terrorist organisation -- which had been sought by Democratic senators -- was published in the government's Federal Register.
ALLIANCE OF MILITANT GROUPS
The TTP was formed in December 2007 as an alliance of Pakistani militant groups to attack the Pakistani state. It believes the government is illegitimate because it is helping NATO and the United States in neighbouring Afghanistan.
The group managed to wrest large swathes of territory in the border area from government control, stretching from South Waziristan to Swat northwest of the capital, Islamabad, before being driven back. But it is widely considered still to be a potent threat.
The TPP hit the U.S. headlines following the Times Square bomb attempt, which saw a naturalized U.S. citizen of Pakistani origin arrested after he parked a sport utility vehicle rigged with a crude explosive device that included firecrackers and propane gas tanks in New York's main tourist hub.
Faisal Shahzad later pleaded guilty and said he had received bomb-making training and $12,000 (£7,762) from the TTP in Pakistan to facilitate the bomb attempt.
Following the incident, five Democratic U.S. senators sent a letter to Clinton urging her to ensure the Pakistani Taliban was on the official terror list. U.S. officials said they were focussed on the group but that the official designation process takes time.
U.S. officials have praised Pakistan's efforts against militants, but Clinton ruffled some feathers when she told the CBS television network that Pakistan would face "severe consequences" if a successful attack in the United States were traced to Pakistan.
There are 46 groups on the U.S. list of "foreign terrorist organizations," including al Qaeda and the Palestinian group Hamas. Designations need to be renewed every two years.
The State Department list of "foreign terrorist organizations" is posted on the Internet at http://www.state.gov/s/ct/rls/other/des/123085.htm
(Reporting by Andrew Quinn; editing by Jackie Frank and Vicki Allen)
