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/ 9 November 2007
A suicide bomber blew himself up at the house of a Pakistani minister in the north-western city of Peshawar on Friday, killing four people, police said. Federal Minister for Political Affairs Amir Muqam, who is also the local head of President Pervez Musharraf’s ruling party, told state television that he was unharmed in the blast.
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/ 8 November 2007
Pakistani national elections will take place before February 15, President Pervez Musharraf said on Thursday, after Western allies and opponents had demanded polls be held on time and emergency rule scrapped. Pakistan had been scheduled to hold elections by mid-January until the general imposed emergency powers on Saturday.
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/ 7 November 2007
Former Pakistan prime minister Benazir Bhutto threatened on Wednesday to lead a mass protest march to the capital unless President Pervez Musharraf quits as army chief, holds elections and restores the Constitution. Bhutto, the politician most capable of mobilising street power, gave Musharraf until Friday to comply.
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/ 7 November 2007
Afghans began three days of national mourning on Wednesday for 41 people, many of them children, killed in the country’s worst suicide attack to date. The attack shakes public confidence in the ability of the Afghan government and the 50 000 foreign troops in the country to provide security.
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/ 6 November 2007
Pakistan’s opposition grappled for a united response on Tuesday to President Pervez Musharraf’s imposition of emergency rule, leaving lawyers to protest alone for a second day and bear the brunt of a police crackdown. Ousted Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry said ”the people should rise up and restore the Constitution”.
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/ 6 November 2007
Pakistani police beat and arrested lawyers protesting for a second day on Tuesday against President Pervez Musharraf’s emergency rule, while officials under United States pressure said an election would be held in early 2008. Opposition politicians, including Benazir Bhutto, have spoken out but there has been no real action on their part so far.
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/ 6 November 2007
Cheering crowds waved Spanish flags as King Juan Carlos visited Spain’s disputed North African enclave of Ceuta on Monday, but hundreds of Moroccans demonstrated against him just across the border. With shouts of ”Long live the King!” and ”Ceuta is Spanish”, thousands of locals roared their approval at Juan Carlos.
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/ 5 November 2007
Pakistani police used tear gas and batons to crush protests by lawyers against President Pervez Musharraf on Monday, despite world outrage at the imposition of a state of emergency. The White House said it was ”deeply disturbed” by the crisis, urging Musharraf, a key ally in the fight against al-Qaeda and Taliban militants, to quit his military post.
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/ 5 November 2007
Pakistan police used tear gas and batons on Monday against lawyers protesting at President Pervez Musharraf’s imposition of emergency rule and detentions mounted, prompting Washington to postpone defence talks. Musharraf cited spiralling militancy and hostile judges to justify Saturday’s action, and slapped reporting curbs on the media.
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/ 5 November 2007
Pakistan police baton-charged lawyers protesting against President Pervez Musharraf’s emergency rule on Monday, as police continued to detain his opponents in the face of United States pressure to hold elections in January. Declaring an emergency on Saturday, General Musharraf cited spiralling militancy and hostile judges to justify his action.
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/ 4 November 2007
Police detained Pakistani opposition figures and lawyers on Sunday as military ruler President Pervez Musharraf tried to stifle the outcry over the imposition of emergency powers. The United States and other Western allies condemned General Musharraf’s decision to announce emergency rule on Saturday.
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/ 4 November 2007
Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has imposed a state of emergency in a bid to end an eight-month crisis over his rule stoked by challenges from a hostile judiciary, Islamist militants and political rivals. General Musharraf said he decided to act on Saturday in response to a rise in extremism and what he called the paralysis of government by judicial interference.
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/ 1 November 2007
A suicide bomber rammed an air force bus in Pakistan on Thursday killing eight people while troops killed up to 70 militants in the north-west, as rumours swirled that President Pervez Musharraf could invoke emergency rule. Nearly 800 people have been killed in militant-linked violence and there have been more than 22 suicide attacks in the last four months.
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/ 31 October 2007
A suicide bomber on a motorcycle rammed a Pakistan Air Force bus — killing at least eight people and wounding 40 — near the central city of Sargodha on Thursday, the military said. The security situation in Pakistan has deteriorated sharply in the past few months at a time of political uncertainty.
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/ 31 October 2007
A Spanish court on Wednesday convicted 21 people of involvement in the 2004 Madrid train bombings, but acquitted a man accused of helping mastermind the al-Qaeda-inspired attack that claimed nearly 200 lives. The heaviest sentences were handed out to two Moroccans and a Spaniard, Jose Emilio Suarez Trashorras.
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/ 31 October 2007
A Spanish court will deliver verdicts on Wednesday on 28 people accused of playing a role in the 2004 Madrid train bombings, ending a politically charged trial into Europe’s deadliest al-Qaeda inspired attack. Ten bombs ripped through four commuter trains early on March 11 2004, strewing the tracks with bodies. The Islamist bombings killed 191 people and injured 1 800.
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/ 31 October 2007
Tropical Storm Noel weakened as it moved across Cuba on Tuesday, dumping torrential rain on already water-logged areas of the Caribbean island after killing at least 18 people in flashfloods and mudslides in the Dominican Republic and Haiti. Double the average rainfall in October has already filled reservoirs in eastern Cuba to the brim and authorities are worried about flooding.
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/ 30 October 2007
Somali President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed called crisis talks on Tuesday to find a new prime minister as the country’s shaky government faced a mounting challenge from Islamist rebels.
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/ 29 October 2007
A suicide bomber on a bicycle killed 28 Iraqi police officers doing their morning exercises at a base north of Baghdad on Monday in one of the deadliest strikes on security forces in months. The attack was a reminder that despite a United States-led crackdown, groups such as al-Qaeda are determined to carry on fighting.
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/ 28 October 2007
United States-led coalition and Afghan troops killed about 80 Taliban fighters in a six-hour battle following an ambush in southern Afghanistan, the US military said on Sunday. Taliban fighters opened fire on Saturday with machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades on the joint coalition and Afghan army patrol from a trench near Musa Qala in Helmand province.
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/ 27 October 2007
Former prime minister Benazir Bhutto set off for her ancestral village in southern Pakistan on Saturday, security heavy in the wake of an assassination attempt at a Karachi welcome rally last week that killed 139 people.
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/ 26 October 2007
Nine French citizens have been arrested in Chad after being accused of attempting to take 103 orphaned children from Darfur out of the country to be adopted by French families, French media reported on Friday. The nine suspects were taken into custody at the airport of Abeche, in eastern Chad, as they were preparing to leave the country with the children.
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/ 24 October 2007
Al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden called for a holy war against a proposed peacekeeping force in Sudan’s war-torn region of Darfur in a message that appeared on jihadi websites on Tuesday. The audio recording was accompanied by a still picture and excerpts were aired by pan-Arab satellite news channel al-Jazeera on Monday.
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/ 23 October 2007
An international rights group has lambasted the Somali government for ”systematic harassment” of reporters, closure of media outlets and failure to investigate the killing of eight journalists this year. Few foreign correspondents go into Somalia these days, leaving local reporters to face the risks.
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/ 22 October 2007
Benazir Bhutto has vowed to press ahead with her campaign to become Pakistan’s next prime minister despite the threat of assassination, and called on the government to seek outside help in investigating last Thursday’s suicide attack. ”We will not be deterred,” she said, after visiting bomb victims at a Karachi hospital.
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/ 20 October 2007
Benazir Bhutto on Friday accused a shadowy web of figures with links to Pakistan’s powerful military establishment of orchestrating Thursday’s huge suicide bombing that killed 138 people and wounded 300. A ”brotherly country” had provided Bhutto with intelligence about four suicide squads roaming Karachi.
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/ 19 October 2007
The Pakistan government blamed Islamist militants for twin blasts early on Friday that killed 133 people as opposition leader Benazir Bhutto drove through masses of supporters in Karachi. Bhutto, travelling in a truck reinforced to withstand bomb attacks, was unhurt by the deadliest bomb attack in her country’s violent history.
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/ 19 October 2007
Pakistani police have found the head of a suspected bomber in a suicide attack that killed at least 133 people as former prime minister Benazir Bhutto passed through masses of supporters in Karachi on Friday. Typically, a bomber’s head is blown off by the upward force of the explosives strapped to his body.
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/ 19 October 2007
A suspected suicide bomber killed 133 people on Friday in an attack on former Pakistani prime minister Benazir Bhutto, as she was driven through Karachi to greet supporters on her return from eight years in exile. Bhutto was unhurt in one of the deadliest attacks in her country’s history.
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/ 18 October 2007
A suspected suicide bomber killed at least 115 people and wounded 100 on Friday in an attack targeting a vehicle carrying former Pakistani prime minister Benazir Bhutto through Karachi on her return from eight years in exile. Bhutto was safe and at her home after leaving the truck that had been transporting her.
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/ 18 October 2007
Former Pakistan prime minister Benazir Bhutto ended eight years of self-exile on Thursday, returning to Karachi where more than 200Â 000 supporters poured on to the streets to welcome her home. ”I am thankful to God, I am very happy that I’m back in my country and I was dreaming of this day,” said Bhutto.
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/ 18 October 2007
Former Pakistan Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto ended eight years of self-exile on Thursday, making a comeback that could eventually lead to power sharing with President Pervez Musharraf. ”I am thankful to God, I am very happy that I’m back in my country and I was dreaming of this day,” said a sobbing Bhutto.