Pakistan

Washington, July 03: The threat of insiders in the nuclear establishment working with outsiders seeking a bomb is nowhere greater than in Pakistan, according to a former officer of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

“Pakistani authorities have a dismal track record in thwarting insider threats,” writes Rolf Mowatt-Larssen, who served as a CIA officer for 23 years, in the July/August issue of Arms Control Today, published by the Arms Control Association.

Islamabad, July 03: US missiles struck a training facility allegedly operated by Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud and a militant hide-out on Friday, killing 15 people and wounding 27 others, intelligence officials said.

The two attacks took place in South Waziristan, a Mehsud stronghold close to the Afghan border, two officials said on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to speak to the media.

Peshawar, July 03: A leader of the Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PML-N) Thursday urged the government to try former Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf in court for using excessive force in the Lal Masjid operation, a media report said.

PML-N leader M.N.A. Khawaja Saad Rafiq has demanded that the government prosecute Musharraf for careless handling of the Lal Masjid and Akbar Bugti cases in which many people were killed, the Online news agency reported.

Musharraf ordered the troops to break into the Lal Masjid to flush out militants who were holed up inside the shrine.

Islamabad, July 03 : At least two people were killed when a suicide bomber blew himself up after ramming his motorcycle into a bus carrying workers from a nuclear facility in the garrison town of Rawalpindi yesterday.

President Asif Zardari condemned the suicide attack.

Pakistan has been hit by a wave of bombings in recent weeks in response to a military offensive against Taleban militants in the northwest of the country, but yesterday’s was the closest to the capital since the launch of the offensive.

Islamabad, July 03 : Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani will meet his Indian counterpart Manmohan Singh on the sidelines of the Non-Aligned Movement summit in Sharm El-Sheikh on July 16, the Pakistan Foreign Ministry has said.

”The Indian and Pakistani Foreign Secretaries will also meet on the sidelines of the summit,” it said, adding that we hope India would realize that resumption of composite dialogue process is in the interest of the two countries.

Islamabad, July 03: A month after 26/11 Mumbai terror attack mastermind Hafiz Saeed was let off the hook, the Punjab government of Pakistan challenged his release on Friday.

The government took up the matter to Pakistan’s Supreme Court. The Punjab government filed a petition in the Supreme Court challenging Saeed’s release from house arrest.

The petition stated that Saeed, the chief of Lashkar-e-Taiba’s (LeT) Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) front, needed to be detained for his own protection.

Saeed was released on June 2 by the Lahore High Court for want of sufficient evidence.

Islamabad, July 03 : A suspected US drone aircraft fired three missiles at a militant hideout in Pakistan’s restive tribal district of South Waziristan on the Afghan border Friday, killing at least 15 people, an intelligence official said.

The missiles reportedly hit the house of a Taliban sympathiser in Kokat Khel village of the district’s Ladha area at around 10.45 a.m. (0445 GMT), demolishing the structure.

“According to our information, 15 people have been killed and 33 others are injured,” said a local intelligence official who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Washington, July 03: Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud is buying children as young as seven years old to carry out suicide bombing, the Online news agency said citing reports on Thursday.

The price for a child bomber is between $7,000 and $14,000, a Pakistani official requesting anonymity said.

Mehsud has turned suicide bombing into a production company, not like the way Toyota produces cars, a US Defense Department official said recently to reporters.

He said the price depends on how quickly the bomber is needed and how close the child is expected to get to the target.

Islamabad, July 03: Pakistani intelligence officials say 11 people were killed in a suspected U.S. missile strike in northwest Pakistan.

The two officials say the attack struck a suspected training facility of Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud early Friday in the villages of Montoi in South Waziristan. A suspected militant hide-out in Kokat Khel was also hit.

South Waziristan is part of the lawless tribal belt along Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan where top Taliban and al-Qaida leaders are believed to be hiding.

Washington, July 03: The threat of insiders in the nuclear establishment working with outsiders seeking a bomb is nowhere greater than in Pakistan, according to a former officer of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

‘Pakistani authorities have a dismal track record in thwarting insider threats,’ writes Rolf Mowatt-Larssen, who served as a CIA officer for 23 years, in the July/August issue of Arms Control Today, published by the Arms Control Association.

Islamabad, July 03: Pakistani Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani warned against possible infiltration of Afghan militants into Pakistan in the wake of fresh offensives by the US and NATO soldiers in Afghanistan.

Gilani made the remarks during a meeting at his house with Admiral Edouard Guillaud, an advisor to the French president, the Online news agency reported.

The Pakistani leader has urged France to provide military equipment and other assistance to deal with militancy.

Islamabad, July 03: Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani sought “pragmatic cooperation” from France in the field of civil nuclear energy to meet Pakistan’s growing energy needs.

During a meeting here with visiting Admiral Edouard Guillaud, the chief military advisor to French President Nicolas Sarkozy, Gilani proposed that the governments of Pakistan and France should chalk out a roadmap for pragmatic cooperation in civil nuclear energy.

A working group could be established to “develop an agreed way forward on nuclear cooperation”, Gilani said.

Rawalpindi, July 02: Six people were killed when a suicide bomber blew himself up after ramming his motorcycle into a bus belonging to the A.Q. Khan nuclear research facility here in Pakistan Thursday, Geo TV reported.

About 30 people were injured in the blast when the motorcyclist hit the stationary bus near a petrol station in the busy commercial area of Chauhar Chowk.

The mangled remains of the motorcycle betrayed it was a suicide attack, police officer Nasir Durrani told reporters. He said there were government officials in the bus but did not elaborate.

Rawalpindi, July 02: At least six people have been killed and two dozen others have been injured by a suicide bomber near a congested junction in Pakistan’s garrison city of Rawalpindi.

The blast happened Thursday on the main Peshawar road in Rawalpindi where the Pakistani military is headquartered.

Sources said the attack appeared to have been a suicide bombing and that the bomber’s body parts had been recovered by police.

Rescue teams rushed the injured to the nearby hospitals.

The death toll is expected to rise as some of the injured are said to be in critical condition.

Islamabad, July 02: The United Nations formally began a six-month investigation yesterday into the slaying of former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, a process that the government hopes will lead to her killers being brought to justice.

The three-member UN commission is being led by Chile’s UN Ambassador Heraldo Munoz, a dissident during the dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet. It began its work yesterday, said UN spokeswoman in Pakistan Ishrat Rizvi.

Islamabad, July 02: Maulana Fazlullah, the commander of the Pakistani Taliban, is reported to have died from injuries sustained during the ongoing military offensive by Pakistani forces.

Pakistani news channel Express 24/7 has reported that Fazlullah, also known as Radio Mullah, may have died of his injuries.

Islamabad, July 02: Pakistan’s Army has deployed troops to a stretch of the Afghan border to stop Taliban militants fleeing a major US offensive in southern Afghanistan, a military spokesman said Thursday.

Major General Athar Abbas told Geo TV that they had ‘mustered more troops from the other areas of the border’ to deploy opposite the Helmand region,

‘It is sort of a reorganisation,’ he said, adding that the threat of militants crossing over had been ‘visualised’. He however gave no more details.

Islamabad, July 02: Pakistan’s military denies intentions of extending its anti-militant campaign to North Waziristan, urging people in the tribal region to cooperate with the army.

Pakistan Army’s helicopters dropped pamphlets in provincial capital Miranshah, calling on the residents to side with the government forces who are fighting pro-Taliban insurgents in neighboring South Waziristan.

The text rejects allegations by miscreants who launch attacks on the military and say the army plans to begin an operation in the area.

Islamabad, July 02: Pakistani tribesmen have launched a massive attack on Taliban-linked militants in the violent northwest, killing more than 42 insurgents.

Tori Lashkar (Tori militia) confronted the terrorists with “full force” and destroyed their hideouts in various parts of Kurram agency, Azmat Ali Khan, a local Shia tribal leader, told Press TV correspondent late Wednesday.

Khan said they killed at least 42 Taliban-inspired militants in the two-day clashes, acknowledging 18 tribal fighters also lost their lives in the skirmishes.

Islamabad, July 02: Two policemen were killed and several others injured in a bomb attack on their vehicles in northwestern Pakistan Thursday morning, the Dawn reported.

The roadside bombing occurred on the outskirts of Peshawar, the capital city of militancy-hit North West Frontier Province.
The injured were taken to a hospital and the condition of some are stated to be critical.
No group has claimed responsibility yet.

—Agencies

Islamabad, July 02: Helicopter gunships attacked the hideouts of Islamist militants in Pakistan’s tribal region bordering Afghanistan, killing at least 28 rebels in overnight action, security officials said Thursday.

The bombardment came hours after a pro-government tribal elder, Malik Guli Shah, and his two guards were shot dead by gunmen in the Khyber district.

“Our three helicopters engaged several positions of Lashkar-e-Islam in the Sandapal and Akakhel areas of Tira Valley (Khyber district) late Wednesday,” said Wajid Ali, a spokesman for the paramilitary Frontier Corps.

Islamabad, July 02: The Pakistani Prime Minister of Yousuf Raza Gilani today said Pakistan wants to establish good relations with India.

He said that people of both countries want to defuse tension between the two countries.

Talking to reporters, he said, we should not waste resources on security money. People of both the countries want to decrease tensions, he added.

Gilani asserted that along with taking steps to enhance confident building measures, the basic problems of the plebs of both the countries should be considered.

—Agencies

Islamabad, July 02: More than 80 percent of Pakistanis view the Taliban as a critical threat to the country, according to an opinion poll released Wednesday, marking a major rise in public support behind the government’s campaign against the militants.

The turn in public mood is a boost to the military in its offensive against the insurgency. Pakistan’s army has been battling militants in the Swat Valley in the country’s northwest, a campaign that has driven some two million civilians from their homes since April, news reports said.

Islamabad, July 02: Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari today pledged to carry on the campaign against terrorism till the “complete elimination” of militants as he reviewed the security situation and military operations against the Taliban with Premier Yousuf Raza Gilani and army chief Ashfaq Kayani.

Zardari, during the meeting with Gilani and Gen Kayani, said the “fight against militancy and terrorism would end with the complete elimination of militants.”

Islamabad, July 01: Pakistan PM Yousuf Raza Gilani was so enamoured by the performance of famous comedian Sohail Ahmed that he gifted him his 50,000 dollar wristwatch.

According to the Daily Times, Gilani sent his costly wristwatch along with a letter of appreciation to the stage actor a few days back.

Ahmed, in one of his shows, said Gilani sent him a letter saying that he watched Ahmed’s programme with great interest and was sending him the watch.

An outspoken opponent of obscenity in stage dramas, Ahmed is famous for using improvised dialogue during his trademark comedy plays.