Two deserters from a paramilitary force arrested for terror links have told Pakistani investigators that Taliban had specific plans to abduct Indian diplomats, including the high commissioner, to swap them for detained militant commanders.
Amid the shouting of slogans against former dictators Zia-ul-Haq and Pervez Musharraf, the members of the lower house of parliament approved 102 amendments, including several that will transfer powers from the office of the President to the Prime Minister.
A "well established, foolproof safety and security culture fully qualifies Pakistan for equal participation in civil nuclear cooperation at the international level, which would help us in addressing our immediate energy problems and would bring greater stability as well," Yousuf Raza Gilani said.
The United Nations has closed all its offices and suspended its operations in this northwestern Pakistani city due to security fears in the wake of an audacious terrorist attack on the US consulate. All UN offices in Peshawar, the capital of the North West Frontier Province, will remain closed for two days because of the security situation.
Indian High Commissioner Sharat Sabharwal said on Saturday that reduced flow of river waters into Pakistan are not the result of any "violation of Indus Waters Treaty by India or any action on our part to divert such flows or to use more than our assigned share of water from Western Rivers".
Pakistan's Attorney General Anwar Mansoor Khan resigned on Friday citing "lack of cooperation" from the Law Minister, a day after he accused him of obstructing efforts to implement the Supreme Court's order to reopen graft cases against President Asif Ali Zardari in Switzerland.
A day after Pakistan's Supreme Court gave the April 5 deadline to the government to reopen graft cases in Switzerland against Asif Ali Zardari, the President's spokesman on Friday said that all verdicts of the apex court will be implemented in letter and spirit.
Pakistan has no objection to India's relations with Afghanistan but these ties should not assume the dimension of encircling the country, Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said on Thursday.
Zardari is "said to have quietly given names of four international personalities--Former US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai, Saudi Arabian intelligence chief Prince Muqran bin Abdul Aziz and the UAE intelligence chief to the UN inquiry commission to ask them: how did they know the secret in advance that Benazir Bhutto would be killed?" The News Daily reported on Thursday.
A landmark constitutional reforms package, which includes proposals to strip the president of his sweeping powers, was on Thursday submitted to the speaker of Pakistan's Parliament by a key committee that finalised it, ahead of its possible introduction in the House on Friday.Raza Rabbani, the leader of the 26-member parliamentary committee on constitutional reforms, presented the package, popularly referred to as the '18th Constitution amendment'.
Former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has convened a meeting of his loyalists in Dubai on April 2 to formally launch a political party, which is likely to be named the All Pakistan Muslim League.
Authorities had written letters to Swiss Attorney General and other officials to reopen the corruption cases that were closed under a controversial graft amnesty issued by ex-military ruler Pervez Musharraf, National Accountability Bureau Chairman Naveed Ahsan's lawyer Abid Zubairi informed a seven-member bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry.
Paramilitary Frontier Corps personnel repelled the attack in which Taliban fighters used suicide bombers, rockets and assault rifles to overwhelm the security forces check post in Jansi area of Khyber tribal region.
The diplomat, Heshmatollah Attarzadeh, who was working as commercial attache in Iran's consulate in Peshawar, was freed 'in a complicated intelligence operation', Iranian state-run television said on Tuesday.
At least 58 people, including militants and civilians, were killed in fierce clashes and artillery and air attacks by security forces on suspected militant positions in the troubled Aurakzai tribal region in northwest Pakistan on Thursday, sources said.
Pakistan on Thursday said the success of its strategic dialogue with the United States should not be judged in the context of whether it can obtain a civil nuclear agreement similar to the one inked by America and India, as Islamabad failed to get a clear commitment from Washington on such a pact. "To judge the success or failure of our relations with the US or this particular dialogue in that narrow context is not appropriate," Foreign Office spokesman Abdul Basit said.
A trust deficit still haunts Pakistan's ties with the United States, which is not entirely convinced of this country's commitment to the war on terror, the Pakistani media said on Thursday, seeking sustained efforts to build on bilateral strategic dialogue to achieve goals like getting a civil nuclear deal.Most Pakistani dailies described Wednesday's upgraded US-Pak strategic dialogue as the start of a new phase in bilateral relations.
Leaders of Pakistan-based banned terrorist groups like the Lashkar-e-Tayiba and Hizb-ul-Mujahideen have called on supporters to wage a 'jihad' or holy war for the liberation of the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir.
Pakistan and the United States are set to hold their first strategic dialogue on Wednesday, but the focus will squarely be on powerful army chief Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, who has played a key role in shaping the government's approach to the parleys, which are expected to cover Indo-Pak ties and Afghanistan. General Kayani, who is currently visiting the US at the invitation of Central Command chief General David Petraeus, will participate in the ministerial-level strategic talks.
The United States on Monday dismissed reports that it was mulling negotiations on a civil nuclear agreement with Pakistan. "The US has not entered (into) negotiations on a civil nuclear agreement with Pakistan," said a spokesperson of the US embassy in the capital, a day after media reports said Washington may discuss Islamabad's request for cooperation in setting up nuclear power plants in the country.