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/ 28 January 2008
Heavily armed militants took about 300 children hostage at a school in Pakistan on Monday but freed them after tense negotiations with tribal elders, the Interior Ministry said. Rebels armed with rocket launchers holed up at the school in the North West Frontier Province after a failed attempt to abduct a local official.
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/ 28 January 2008
Gunmen took hostage up to 250 Pakistani schoolchildren in the north-western town of Bannu on Monday after taking refuge in the school following a clash with police, officials said. Violence has spread across Pakistan in recent months, seeping out of remote tribal regions that are sanctuaries for al-Qaeda and Taliban militants and into cities and towns.
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/ 25 January 2008
Up to 30 pro-Taliban militants and two soldiers were killed in clashes in a tribal region in north-western Pakistan on Friday, the military said. The clashes broke out in Darra Adam Kheil tribal region near the city of Peshawar a day after militants seized four trucks carrying ammunition and other supplies for paramilitary forces.
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/ 24 January 2008
Pakistani forces have cleared militant strongholds from three areas in the South Waziristan region on the Afghan border and 40 militants and eight soldiers have been killed in fighting, the military said on Thursday. The army is sending reinforcements and using tanks in the area after a week of fighting with militants.
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/ 21 January 2008
Pakistan established a new record in crushing Zimbabwe by 104 runs in the first one-day international (ODI) in Pakistan on Monday. Pakistan piled up a total of 347-5 and then restricted the visitors to 243-7 in 50 overs. It was the first time in 2 662 one-day internationals that five batsmen scored half centuries in an innings.
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/ 18 January 2008
Pakistani forces killed up to 90 militants in two battles on Friday in the South Waziristan region on the Afghan border, the military said. The clashes came two days after hundreds of militants overran a paramilitary fort in another part of South Waziristan.
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/ 18 January 2008
A few days ago a Pakistani newspaper published a cartoon of a political weather map forecasting bombs all across Pakistan. It is all too real. There has been no let-up in attacks in a country still reeling from the assassination of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto in a gun and suicide-bomb attack last month.
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/ 15 January 2008
Pakistani political leaders face a looming threat of attack and must get serious about their security and avoid unnecessary exposure in the run-up to a February general election, the government said on Tuesday. Opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was killed in a gun and bomb attack as she left an election rally in the city of Rawalpindi on December 27.
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/ 14 January 2008
Pakistani security forces killed 23 Taliban fighters and lost seven of their own men during clashes on Monday, according to an army officer, while a Taliban spokesperson said 17 troopers were captured. Residents in Mohmand said the army had opened up with artillery and helicopter gunships after the Taliban ambushed a paramilitary troop convoy.
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/ 12 January 2008
A suicide bomb attack that killed 19 people in Lahore, which had been a haven from violence, demonstrates an intensifying show-down with militants at a time when Pakistan is in a volatile political flux. The blast in the country’s political nerve centre on Thursday carried an ominous message ahead of February’s national election.
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/ 10 January 2008
At least 22 Pakistani riot police were killed in a suicide-bomb attack outside the high court in the commercial heart of Lahore on Thursday, officers said. The bomber set off a device packed with ball bearings when police stopped him outside the court, two weeks to the day after the assassination of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto.
Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf said on Tuesday his government was committed to finding the truth behind the assassination of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto and he vowed to punish her killers. Bhutto, twice Pakistan’s prime minister, was killed in an attack on December 27 as she left an election rally in Rawalpindi.
A British police team flew into Pakistan on Friday to help probe the killing of Benazir Bhutto after President Pervez Musharraf admitted he was unhappy with his country’s handling of the investigation. The detectives from an elite anti-terrorism team at Scotland Yard flew in amid raging controversy over the assassination of the opposition leader.
A team of police from Britain’s Scotland Yard is expected to arrive in Pakistan on Friday to help probe the assassination of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto as the controversy over her death rages on. On Thursday, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf admitted he was ”not fully satisfied” with his own country’s handling of the investigation.
Pakistan’s opposition parties demanded better security on Thursday as the nation prepared for a lengthy campaign ahead of February 18 elections, a week after the assassination of Benazir Bhutto. The country’s main political parties confirmed they would resume the race to restore democracy but said the government must ensure candidates are protected.
Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf called for help from British police in probing the murder of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto as he sought to dampen public anger on Thursday a week after her death. He said a Scotland Yard team would "immediately" come to help resolve doubts surrounding the circumstances of how she died.
Pakistan’s general election has been delayed until February 18 because of unrest sparked by the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, the chief election commissioner announced on Wednesday. ”In the light of the circumstances, the new date for general elections is February 18 2008 instead of January 8,” chief election commissioner Qazi Mohammad Farooq said.
Pakistan election officials were Wednesday poised to announce the date of crucial polls, thrown into chaos in the wake of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto’s assassination. A few hours later President Pervez Musharraf is to address the nation for the first time since her slaying at a campaign rally last week.
Pakistan’s election commission said the date for parliamentary elections would be announced on Wednesday, with a delay until February now in view following the assassination of Benazir Bhutto. The January 8 vote, the next step along the road to civilian-led democracy in Pakistan, was thrown into chaos with the killing of the opposition leader last week.
Pakistan parliamentary elections scheduled for January 8 will be held in February, a senior election commission said on Tuesday. ”Elections will not be delayed beyond February. We expect it to be towards the later part of next month,” the official said. The commission was to make a public announcement later in the day.
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/ 31 December 2007
Pakistan’s elections will be delayed by at least four weeks due to mass unrest after the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, a Cabinet official said on Monday. Other government and election officials confirmed that the January 8 polls would be postponed. Bhutto’s party rejected any delay.
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/ 31 December 2007
Pakistani officials were to meet on Monday to decide the fate of scheduled January 8 elections, after Benazir Bhutto’s party announced it would contest the vote despite her assassination. The vote, seen as a key step in the nuclear-armed nation’s transition back to democracy after eight years of military rule, has been thrown into disarray by her slaying.
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/ 30 December 2007
The son of slain Pakistan opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was chosen on Sunday to take the mantle of her party and immediately vowed to keep up what he called her struggle for democracy. At an emotional news conference where his father was named co-chair of the Pakistan People’s Party, 19-year-old Bilawal Bhutto said he was ready to lead.
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/ 30 December 2007
Pakistan’s political future hung in the balance on Sunday with Benazir Bhutto’s party deciding whether to pull out of planned elections amid an acrimonious dispute over how she was killed. Her husband and top party officials were also expected to name a successor to Bhutto as head of the country’s largest opposition party.
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/ 29 December 2007
Benazir Bhutto’s party challenged official versions of the opposition leader’s assassination and accused the government on Saturday of trying to cover up failures just days before planned elections. Meanwhile, al-Qaeda-linked militants denied being behind the killing of the 54-year-old former prime minister.
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/ 29 December 2007
Pakistan was on Saturday gripped by division and uncertainty following the burial of slain opposition leader Benazir Bhutto as her supporters angrily rejected a government explanation of her death. Bhutto died on Thursday shortly after a suicide attack targeting her vehicle at a campaign rally in the northern city of Rawalpindi.
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/ 28 December 2007
Benazir Bhutto was laid to rest next to her father in the family mausoleum on Friday after the opposition leader’s assassination plunged Pakistan into crisis and triggered violent protests across her native Sindh province. Thousands of mourners wept as Bhutto was carried from her ancestral home in Sindh to the mausoleum.
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/ 28 December 2007
Pakistan pointed a finger on Friday at al-Qaeda for the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, as her body was taken to her ancestral home for burial and anger at her death erupted into deadly unrest. The scale of the violence left the nuclear-armed Muslim nation shell-shocked, triggering alarm around the world.
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/ 28 December 2007
The body of Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was taken to her family village for burial on Friday, a day after her assassination plunged the nuclear-armed country into one of the worst crises in its 60-year history. Her killing after an election rally in the city of Rawalpindi triggered a wave of violence.
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/ 27 December 2007
Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was assassinated on Thursday as she left an election rally in the city of Rawalpindi, putting January 8 polls in doubt and sparking anger in her native Sindh province. State media and her party confirmed Bhutto’s death from a gun and bomb attack. ”She has been martyred,” said party official Rehman Malik.
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/ 27 December 2007
Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, slain in a suicide attack in Rawalpindi on December 27, knew very well the risks she ran when she decided to wage a public campaign for the restoration of democracy. Hours after she returned home in October after eight years of self-imposed exile, a suicide bomber killed nearly 150 people in an attack targeting her motorcade.
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/ 27 December 2007
Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was wounded in a gun and suicide bomb attack after an election rally in the city of Rawalpindi on Thursday, a party security official and police said. ”She is injured,” said party security official Rehman Malik. She had been taken to hospital.