Pakistan

New Delhi, August 08: In a new twist, a militant commander and deputy to Baitullah Mehsud on Saturday reportedly said that the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan chief is alive.

Baitullah is hiding at a covert place, Hakimullah Mehsud said, refuting earlier reports that the Pak Taliban chief was killed in a US drone attack in South Waziristan on August 05.

According to the latest news report, Hakimullah claimed that Baitullah was still holding the command of Taliban fighters. The Taliban commander further vowed to release a recorded video of Baitullah in the coming days.

Washington, August 08: Pakistan’s most wanted terrorist Baitullah Mehsud’s death may actually embolden the Pakistanis as it marks a weakening of those Taliban factions that oppose Islamabad, a leading US private intelligence agency has said.

“With more confidence in its influence over the remaining Taliban elements, Pakistan could be even less willing to sell out its Taliban assets in Afghanistan,” the Stratfor said.

Islamabad, August 08: Pakistani militants have formed two groups to free their comrades from various prisons in the country, a media report said.

The two groups named Lashkar Omar and Lashkar Abu Jandal will devise strategies to free their associates who were captured during the military operation in northwest Pakistan, the Online news agency reported on Friday. There are also suicide bombers in the groups.

Islamabad, August 08: The Pakistan Taliban were meeting last night to choose a new leader after Baitullah Mehsud, Pakistan’s most wanted man, was killed in a CIA-led air strike, dealing a major blow to the insurgency that has ravaged the north-west and the wild tribal areas along the Afghan border.

Islamabad, August 08: Uncertainty loomed on Thursday night over the report of Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud’s killing as the White House refused to confirm the report even as Pakistan went all out to claim it was true.

The Pakistan government and Tehrik-e-Taliban earlier in the day confirmed the death of Baitullah Mehsud and his second wife in an August 5 drone strike by US forces in south Wajiristan region of Pakistan.

Islamabad, August 07: Pakistani authorities have claimed that the latest dossier provided by India on the Mumbai attacks is “inadequate” to prosecute several Lashker-e-Taiba operatives being tried by an anti-terror court, according to a media report today.

“Our security agencies, who have studied and analysed the latest dossier from India, have concluded that New Delhi has not provided enough information required by us,” an unnamed senior official was quoted as saying by the Dawn newspaper.

Dhaka, August 07: Pakistan should try those responsible for the genocide that took place during Bangladesh’s freedom struggle in 1971, a Canadian lawyer has said while endorsing Dhaka’s move to try those it considers ‘war criminals’.

Trying those responsible for the killings of unarmed civilians was necessary ‘to stop recurrence of genocide and end culture of impunity’, David Matas, who has dealt with Rwanda genocide and Nazi war criminals, told The Daily Star newspaper.

Islamabad, August 07: This time the line of vehicles snaking for miles down the sweltering valley – small cars packed with families and large trucks heaving with livestock and furniture – are not fleeing; the refugees from Swat are returning home. After eight weeks of intense fighting, the Pakistan army has told the estimated 2 million people who fled the valley that the Taliban, which menaced their lives through a brutal campaign of beheadings, bombings, kidnappings and school-burnings, is on the verge of defeat.

Islamabad, August 07: Tehreek-e-Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud may have been killed in a US drone attack in South Waziristan and Pakistani and American officials are collecting “physical evidence” to confirm his death.

Quoting unnamed senior Administration officials, the popular ABC News said the US and Pakistani officials now believe that Mehsud, a key al-Qaeda facilitator in Pakistan, is “very likely” killed in Wednesday’s pre-dawn attack that also resulted in the death of his second wife.

Islamabad, August 07: In a major development, Tehrik-e-Taliban on Friday confirmed the death of its leader Baitullah Mehsud and his second wife in an August 5 drone strike by US forces in south Wajiristan region of Pakistan.

According to reports, Tehrik-e-Taliban has also revealed that Mehsud’s funeral was held in Narkosa village yesterday.

Following the death of its leader, the Tehrik-e-Taliban’s advisory council Shura is now scheduled to meet later today to elect Mehsud’s new successor who will carry forward the militant organisation’s anti-US agenda.

Islamabad, August 07: Six days after India provided additional information on the involvement of Jamaat-ud Dawa (JuD) chief Hafiz Saeed in the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks, Pakistan on Thursday said this was inadequate.

At the same time, it expressed confidence that the upcoming meetings between the foreign secretaries and foreign ministers of the two countries would lead to progress for resumption of the composite dialogue process that India had frozen in the wake of the Mumbai mayhem.

Islamabad, August 06: In a “major breakthrough” in its probe into the Mumbai terror attacks, Pakistan has arrested a key suspect with links to the outlawed LeT for allegedly facilitating the 26/11 strikes. The Special Investigation Unit (SIU) of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), which is spearheading Pakistans probe into the Mumbai incident, arrested Jamil Ahmed yesterday on the basis of information provided by other suspects.

Islamabad, August 06: A bus has plunged into a raging river in the Skardu district in Pakistan’s mountainous north with all except one of its 35 passengers feared dead.

The bus, carrying 35 people, including 27 soldiers on leave, was en route to the town of Skardu when it fell several hundred meters into the Indus River near Rondo, about 80 kilometers short of its destination.

Islamabad, August 06: A Pakistani security official said late Wednesday the intelligence agencies were trying to confirm reports that Taliban head Baitullah Mehsud had died in a suspected US missile strike that killed his wife in tribal region near Afghan border.

“We have been busy for hours to check the information coming from the area that Baitullah also died with his wife,” a local intelligence officer said on condition of anonymity.

“Whether confirmation or disconfirmation will definitely be available in next couple of hours,” he added.

Islamabad, August 06: Pakistani tribesmen have raided hideouts of pro-Taliban militants in the restive North-West Frontier Province, killing a dozen insurgents.

A local lashkar (tribal militia) attacked the militants in Shatkas area of Upper Dir district on Wednesday, killing a senior commander along with 11 others, Press TV correspondent reported.

Heavy fighting continues between the two sides in Ghazigae Baba area where the local forces are struggling to drive militants out of the remaining half of the area which remains under their control.

Islamabad, August 06: The Pakistani premier says the government is bound to implement the decision of parliament if lawmakers pass a resolution to hold trial of Pervez Musharraf.

“If the house unanimously brings a resolution, we will implement it. I am with the parliament,” Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani said, commenting on the imposition of the state of emergency in the country in 2007 by former military ruler Musharraf, a Press TV correspondent reported.

Gojra, August 06: The Christian and Muslim residents of Gojra town are determined not to allow the recent killing of seven Christians by an angry mob over alleged desecration of Quran to spoil decades of peaceful coexistence.

“It was not an act by local people. It was done by miscreants who came from outside,” Manzoor Masih, one of the victims of the recent violence, told.

An angry mob attacked Christians in the heart of Gojra, some 55 kilometers from the textile city of Faisalabad, over a reported desecration of the Muslim holy book.

Islamabad, August 06: A senior leader of the ruling Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) has denied media reports that former military ruler Pervez Musharraf has been given official security in London where he has decided to live in exile.

No official security has been provided to Musharraf in London, Online news agency quoted Fouzia Wahab, information secretary of Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), as saying here Wednesday.

Islamabad, August 05: Targeting Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud, US drones destroyed his father-in-law’s house, killing him and the militant commander’s wife along with two others in a pre-dawn attack in the lawless tribal belt.

Official sources were quoted by a television news channel as saying that the militant leader’s second wife and her father, Malik Ikramuddin, were killed when the drone struck their home near Makeen, a village in a remote area of South Waziristan dominated by the Mehsud tribe.

Islamabad, August 05: A suspected US drone attack, targeted at Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud’s hideout, Wednesday killed four people in Pakistan’s South Waziristan tribal area, a media report said.

Security official said the hideout of Baitullah Mahsud was targeted in the drone attack that took place in the area near Afghanistan.

–Agencies

Islamabad, August 05: The wife of Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud was killed in a suspected US drone strike in northwestern Pakistan’s South Waziristan tribal agency, TV channels reported Wednesday.

TV reports said the drone hit the house of Akramuddin, father-in-law of Mehsud, killing four people and injuring two others. The Pakistani army has been hunting Mehsud for weeks.

Relatives said that Mehsud’s wife was among the dead but there was no official confirmation.

Officials said that the drone attack destroyed the house.

Islamabad, August 05: A Pakistan Air Force jet fighter crashed Wednesday near the north-western town of Attock, killing the pilot, the military said.

The Chinese-built F-7 aircraft was on a routine training mission when it went down in a field after apparently suffering a technical failure, air force spokesman Air Commodore Tariq Yazdani said.

No one on the ground was injured.

An inquiry was begun into the cause of the accident.

—–Agencies

Islamabad, August 05: When Iran sought to hide its crackdown on people protesting the allegedly rigged presidential election of June 12, young Hamid Raza Khoshnya used his weblog to keep the world enlightened about the regime’s brutality.

But the over-vigilant secret agents of the Islamic republic lost little time in tracing his ‘internet mischief’. When they came knocking at his door, Khoshnya, 23, had little option but to flee.

Washington, August 04: Pak Christians have accused the police of failing to protect them following an anti-Christian riot left eight people dead in the town of Gojra over the weekend.

Pakistani authorities have arrested 100 people and offered USD 6,000 in compensation to Christian families in an effort to reassure the country’s minority that they will be protected by the law.

Islamabad, August 04: Pakistan-based outlawed groups Lashkar-e-Toiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed have supported the Taliban and al Qaeda in destabilising the country, Interior Minister Rehman Malik has said.

Malik, who made the remark while talking to a Pakistani TV news channel, did not give details of the linkages between the two outfits and the Taliban and al Qaeda.

Pakistan recently acknowledged that the Mumbai terrorist attack was planned and executed by the LeT, which was banned in the country in 2002.