A top al-Qaeda operative indicted for the 1998 United States embassy bombings in Africa was the target of a Pakistani military strike and is believed to have been killed, a security official said on Thursday. The raid is believed to have killed Egyptian-born explosives expert Abdul Rahman al-Muhajir and seven other militants.
Relatives on Wednesday began burying the dead from a suspected suicide bombing at a religious gathering in the southern Pakistani city of Karachi as the death toll rose to at least 57. Police and paramilitary forces were put on high alert after the blast blew up dozens of people — including top leaders of a religious organisation, Jamaat-e-Ahle Sunnat.
Before the massive earthquake that laid waste to a swathe of South Asia on October 8 last year, Assia Begum had four children. A few terrifying minutes afterwards, she had nine. Assia instantly took charge of five children born to her husband’s second wife, Shenaz, who lay crushed to death in the ruins of their shared house.
Pakistani forces using helicopter gunships killed up to 20 pro-Taliban militants near the Afghan border early on Friday after an attack on a security post left one soldier dead, officials said. The fighting in the restive district of North Waziristan came a day after President Pervez Musharraf ordered foreign al-Qaeda militants to quit Pakistani tribal areas bordering Afghanistan or be killed.
In his office in Peshawar’s historic Mohabat Khan mosque, prayer leader Maulana Yousaf Qureshi smoothes his beard from the white roots to the henna-orange tips. "There’s no time limit. If someone kills the cartoonist in 50 years he will still get the million dollars," he says.
Somewhere beneath the thousands of multicoloured kites that flash above the rooftops in defiance of a government ban, Rizwan Ahmed is mourning the death of his four-year-old son Shayan. ”You cannot imagine the horrible and tragic scene. My son’s throat was completely cut open,” he says from his humble home in a suburb of Lahore.
A vehicle carrying a wedding party hit a landmine in Pakistan’s restive south-western province of Baluchistan on Friday, killing 26 people and injuring seven, provincial officials said. The blast ripped through a trailer being pulled by a tractor on a remote mountain trail near the town of Rakhni, about 300km east of Quetta.
A Red Cross helicopter crashed while ferrying food to earthquake survivors in Pakistan-administered Kashmir on Thursday, injuring the two South African crew members, officials said. The International Committee of the Red Cross said the Puma transport helicopter came down near a heliport in Muzaffarabad.
Nearly 120 pro-Taliban militants have been killed during three days of clashes with Pakistani forces in a remote tribal town, the military said on Monday. ”According to latest information, the death toll in fighting last Saturday has gone up to 100,” military spokesman Major General Shaukat Sultan told Agence France-Presse.
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/ 23 February 2006
When the October 8 earthquake split a Pakistani mountain, two villages and 560 people were buried under a 2,1km-long rock slide. Now the huge pile of earth and boulders is threatening Hattian Bala, a village of 1 500 homes, as the approaching monsoon season poses new dangers of flooding, officials said on Thursday.
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/ 16 February 2006
Rahul Dravid hit a patient half-century and paceman Rudra Pratap Singh grabbed four wickets as India trounced Pakistan by five wickets in the fourth one-day match on Thursday. Dravid scored 59 as India overtook Pakistan’s modest 162-run target with 17,3 overs to spare at Multan stadium, giving the tourists an unbeatable 3-1 lead in the five-match series.
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/ 14 February 2006
Police used tear gas and water cannon on Tuesday to disperse hundreds of students who stormed the diplomatic enclave in Pakistan’s capital in protest against cartoons of the prophet Muhammad. Around 600 demonstrators, most of them wearing school uniforms, chanted "Death to Denmark, Death to America" as they marched towards the Indian and British high commissions.
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/ 13 February 2006
Star batsman Sachin Tendulkar missed a century on Monday but anchored India to a five-wicket win over Pakistan, with Mahendra Dhoni and Yuvraj Singh also scoring beligerent half-centuries in the third limited-overs international. The victory gave India a 2-1 lead over Pakistan in the five-match series.
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/ 13 February 2006
Hundreds of Indian cricket fans faced frustrating delays on Sunday in collecting tickets booked over the internet on the eve of the third limited-overs international between Pakistan and India in the eastern city of Lahore. The five-match limited-overs series between the two Asian nuclear neighbours is tied 1-1.
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/ 9 February 2006
Sectarian Muslim violence marred the holiest day of the Shi’ite calendar on Thursday, with 25 people killed and more than 100 injured by bombings and clashes in Pakistan and Afghanistan. The violence erupted with a suspected suicide attack on Shi’ites in Hangu, northwestern Pakistan, as they celebrated Ashura.
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/ 9 February 2006
A suspected suicide attack tore into Shi’ite Muslims in Pakistan on Thursday as they celebrated the holiest day in their calendar, sparking riots and leaving at least 31 people dead and 50 wounded, officials said. Soldiers rushed to the northwestern town of Hangu after angry Shi’ites torched shops and cars following the attack on devotees marking Ashura.
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/ 9 February 2006
At least 10 people were killed in Pakistan and around 25 wounded on Thursday in a possible suicide attack on Shi’ite Muslims celebrating one of their holiest holidays, senior officials said. Gunfire and a series of explosions tore into a procession of Shi’ites in the north-west town of Hangu as they were marking Ashura.
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/ 9 February 2006
An explosion and gunfire hit a procession of Shi’ite Muslims in north-western Pakistan on Thursday, killing at least four people and injuring many others, police said. ”The situation is very bad in the town. Initial reports say some four people have died and many more are injured in the explosion and gunfire,” an official said.
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/ 6 February 2006
Opener Salman Butt hit a punishing century and Shoaib Malik a quickfire 90 to help Pakistan score a dramatic seven-run win under special bad-light rules against India in Peshawar on Monday. Pakistan, chasing 329 to win, were 311-7 in 47 overs before the light stopped play.
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/ 6 February 2006
Spring is around the corner for millions of Pakistanis left homeless by last year’s giant earthquake, even if it doesn’t feel like it as Hafez Gullamullah tramps through knee-deep snow. When the thaw comes at the end of March in Pitchbala, the father-of-three and his fellow villagers will finally be able to start rebuilding their homes.
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/ 1 February 2006
Pakistan seamers Abdul Razzaq and Mohammad Asif shared seven wickets on Wednesday and engineered India’s second-heaviest-ever defeat on the fourth day of the third and decisive cricket Test to clinch the series 1-0. India were dismissed for 265 in 58,4 overs after Pakistan set a never-achieved victory target of 607 runs.
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/ 18 January 2006
United Nations helicopters resumed vital relief flights to quake-hit parts of Pakistan on Wednesday after being suspended for three days by heavy rain and snow, officials said. Up to 18 helicopters will be flying extra sorties to make up for lost time and get supplies to cold and hungry survivors of the October 8 disaster.
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/ 14 January 2006
Pakistan is investigating whether al-Qaeda deputy leader Ayman al-Zawahiri was killed in a deadly United States air strike on a village near the Afghan border, Pakistani and US officials said on Saturday. US Central Intelligence Agency sources said they had unconfirmed indications that a high-level target was killed by a US Predator drone in Pakistan.
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/ 11 January 2006
India go into the first Test against arch-rivals Pakistan in Lahore on Friday struggling to find a place in the playing eleven for former captain Sourav Ganguly. Sacked as captain in October after a damaging row with coach Greg Chappell and struggling to find his best form with the bat, Ganguly has created a selection headache for the team management.
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/ 13 December 2005
The International Cricket Council (ICC) on Monday pledged to crack down on verbal sparring during international matches, saying it does not want to see the game reduced to a ”hooligan sport”. The ICC also released a statement from its headquarters in Dubai on Sunday, singling out Australia and South Africa as the worst trash talkers.
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/ 13 December 2005
A strong tremor triggered panic on Tuesday among survivors of October’s earthquake disaster in South Asia, forcing people out of temporary shelters and into the freezing Himalayan winter. Witnesses said it felt like the strongest tremor since the disastrous 7,6-magnitude earthquake on October 8.
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/ 12 December 2005
Pakistani police were on Monday investigating the deaths of at least 38 people killed on their way home from a wedding party in the eastern city of Lahore when firecrackers exploded on their crowded bus. The incident occurred on Sunday, sending fire sweeping through the bus and killing 38 passengers, all of them wedding guests.
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/ 10 December 2005
Andrew Strauss missed his deserved century on Saturday, but paceman Liam Plunkett (3-51) filled the role of super sub with perfection and led England to a 42-run victory over Pakistan in the first limited-overs cricket international. Strauss’s 94 helped England score 327 for four off their 50 overs.
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/ 2 December 2005
Aid officials warned on Friday that almost all of the hundreds of thousands of tents they distributed to survivors of Pakistan’s massive earthquake last month aren’t adequate for the harsh winter, while Pakistan announced soldiers have built 30 000 shelters for the 3,5-million people who lost their homes.
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/ 1 December 2005
England cricket coach Duncan Fletcher conceded on Thursday his Ashes-winning team was in danger of losing the Test series on ”a mentally tough tour of Pakistan”. ”It’s mentally a tough tour as most of the time we are stuck in our hotels and it has got to the players a little bit,” Fletcher said after England conceded a big lead on the third day of the third and final Test in Lahore.
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/ 1 December 2005
Earthquake survivors in Pakistan said on Thursday they fear for their future as a bitter winter intensifies and their life in makeshift tent camps becomes more miserable with each passing day. Almost eight weeks after the devastating October 8 disaster, which killed more than 73 000 people, the fate of the 3,5-million others who were left homeless is far from secure.
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/ 28 November 2005
The onset of winter claimed the lives of at least two earthquake survivors on Monday — the first confirmed victims of what officials fear will be a new disaster for the 3,5-million Pakistanis who lost their homes last month. More than 100 people were brought to hospitals with hypothermia and respiratory diseases.