Pakistan government will 'think whether there is any need' for a military operation in North Waziristan and not take dictation from anyone on launching a campaign against militants in the tribal region, Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani has said
Pakistan Army Chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani has not ruled out the possibility of an American ground offensive in North Waziristan, but told parliamentarians at a briefing that Washington will have to think many times before launching such an attack.
An unmanned United States spy plane struck a vehicle in the volatile North Waziristan tribal region of Pakistan today, killing seven suspected militants.
After intense pressure from the United States, Pakistan has reportedly agreed to launch a full-scale offensive against the Taliban and other extremist organisations in their stronghold North Waziristan, but has also clarified to the Obama administration that the timing of the military offensive would be decided by it.
Days after Pakistan Army chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani called for an end to drone attacks in his country, unmanned American spy planes today unleashed 10 missiles at a compound in the volatile North Waziristan, killing at least 25 people, including civilians.
The United States has reportedly rejected Pakistan's fresh demands of handing over unmanned drone technology to it, highly placed sources in the Pakistan military have revealed, adding that Washington's refusal could result in Islamabad further delaying its decision to launch a new war front against militants in North Waziristan.
The Pentagon leadership has strongly denied reports that it has pressurised Pakistani army chief General Ashfaq Kayani to extend the military's anti-Taliban operations into North Waziristan, in the wake of the botched Times Square bombing attempt by Pakistani-American Faisal Shahzad, who received terror training in that region.
At least five people, including a child, were killed and 29 others injured on Tuesday in a powerful car bomb suicide attack by the Taliban targeting a senior military officer in this restive northwestern Pakistani city.
Over a year after US and Pakistani authorities claimed to have killed Mehsud in a drone strike in North Waziristan, the Pakistan Taliban chief made an appearance in a video footage showing the killing of former Inter-Services Intelligence officer Colonel Sultan Ameer Tarar, commonly known as Colonel Imam on Saturday.
A former Inter-Services Intelligence official, who was reported to have been killed by militants who abducted him, is alive and in the custody of Taliban fighters in the Waziristan tribal region, a media report said on Tuesday.
The Pakistan political leadership may be calling for 'peace talks' with India, but the country's military continues to spread propaganda by dropping pamphlets in North Waziristan that link the Taliban with India's external intelligence agency, the Research and Analysis Wing.
A Taliban commander in Pakistan's volatile tribal belt has broken away from the militant outfit to form his own group, as he is opposed to suicide attacks on mosques and civilians.
Terrorists targetted a police van with a roadside bomb in northwest Pakistan's restive Bannu region on Thursday, killing at least two security personnel and injuring five others, a day after a suicide attack on a police station in the same area claimed 20 lives.
Afghan Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar has reportedly been killed in Pakistan, an Afghanistan private television channel has reported.
Al Qaeda has made jihadi commander Ilyas Kashmiri as its chief military strategist for the region to plan and spearhead terrorist attacks against the West.
Pakistan has agreed in principle to launch a full-fledged military operation against Taliban militants in North Waziristan. But it will be a tough task for the country's army, as the terrain is believed to be the stronghold of numerous Arab, central Asian, Pashtun and Punjabi militants.The military operation may increase the flow of US aid to Pakistan, but the consequences might be unaffordable for the beleaguered country.
In a major setback to Taliban, missiles fired from US drones have killed its top commander and group's deputy chief Qari Hussain Mehsud, mastermind of many suicide attacks across Pakistan, sources claimed on Friday.
Sixteen militants were killed in two United States drone strikes within last 24 hours in Pakistan's restive tribal region, ending a five-month hiatus.
In yet another show of its 'barbaric' justice, the Taliban blew up two alleged United States spies in a village near Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan in Pakistan.
The Pakistan Army distanced itself from media reports that its chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani had arranged a secret meeting between Afghan President Hamid Karzai and the leader of the Haqqani militant network based in North Waziristan.
Refusing to release the abducted journalist Mohammad Rashid, who is associated with the Associated Press, the North Waziristan Taliban has said that Rashid is being interrogated to ascertain his motives behind coming to Miramshah.
NATO on Sunday resumed supplies for its forces in Afghanistan after Pakistan reopened the main supply line, which it had closed to protest the death of its two soldiers in a cross-border raid, even as United States drones killed 7 militants in North Waziristan tribal area in a fresh attack.
Atiyah Abd al-Rahman, an Al Qaeda operative of Libyan origin, died in a missile strike on Thursday, said the officials who spoke on condition of anonymity.
A hitherto unheard of militant group called the Asian Tigers on Monday issued a video of two top former ISI officials and a journalist whom it claimed to have kidnapped in Pakistan's volatile tribal belt.
However, it is not clear whether the Moscow bombings have been carried out by anti-Russian Chechen rebels or by Chechen separatists linked to the Al Qaeda who receive their training in the borderlands of Afghanistan-Pakistan. Indian intelligence officials believe these groups are increasingly linked, pointing out that the suicide attacks could also be in retaliation against the Russian decision to allow US and NATO forces to send non-lethal equipment through Russia to Afghani
Stepping up a campaign against the group, 10 to 12 drones carried out a wave of pre-dawn attacks on Dargah Mandi and Danday Darpa Khel near Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan Agency, officials and witnesses were quoted as saying by TV news channels.
Osama bin Laden and his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri, the world's most wanted terrorists, are hiding "inside Pakistan", CIA chief Leon Panetta has said and claimed that aggressive US operations against Al Qaeda have disrupted its ability to plan sophisticated attacks.
United States carried out the heaviest bombing so far of Pakistan's lawless tribal belt as a swarm of drones fired a volley of 19 hellfire missiles at the den of the fighters of Haqqani network, killing 31 militants, including two Taliban commanders and several foreign fighters.
Nasir Al-Wuhayshi, 32, was a key member of the Al Qaeda. He received jihadi training directly from Al Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan.
At least 14 Taliban militants were killed in twin US drone attacks in Pakistan's restive northwest on Wednesday while five soldiers and as many militants died in violence, including in a suicide bombing at an army barrack in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.
US drones fired missiles targeting the house of a local man identified as Dilbar in Indi Khel village in Bannu, which is part of Pakistan's North West Frontier Province, and killed four people including two foreigners, TV channels reported.
US officials said the message did not amount to an ultimatum but rather it was intended to "prod a reluctant Pakistani military" to go after Taliban insurgents in Pakistan who are directing attacks in Afghanistan.
The Obama administration is stepping up pressure on Pakistan to expand and reorient its fight against Taliban and Al Qaeda and wants its army to pursue the militants into north Waziristan.
A beefed-up campaign of American drone strikes over the last three months has battered Al Qaeda and Taliban militants in the tribal area of North Waziristan, says a report in the New York Times.
Umar Khalid, Maulana Fazlullah and Khan Said alias Sajna are under consideration for the top slot, the report said quoting sources.
He was once General Pervez Musharraf's blue eyed boy, receiving a cash award of Rs 100,000 in 2000 from Pakistan's then president for killing an Indian Army officer. Eighteen months later, after 9/11, Musharraf declared him a terrorist.
The Pakistani Taliban confirmed on Tuesday, that its chief Hakimullah Mehsud had died of injuries sustained in a US drone strike, ending weeks of speculation over his fate.Taliban sources based in the Aurakzai tribal region told TV news channels that 28-year-old Mehsud was severely injured in a drone attack in Shaktoi area of North Waziristan Agency on January 14.
A hitherto unknown pro-Taliban group called 'Ansar Wa Mohajir' has claimed responsibility for Wednesday's car bomb attack in Lahore, for which four alleged Indian nationals have reportedly been arrested by Pakistani authorities.
Heavily-armed Taliban militants have abducted nearly 400 students and staff members of a cadet college after intercepting a convoy of buses in a lawless tribal region near the North West Frontier Province.
At least eight people were killed and six others injured when two missiles fired by a suspected US drone hit a 'madrassa' founded by a Taliban leader in Pakistan's restive tribal region. The drone fired missiles at Taliban leader Sirajuddin Haqqani's madrassa located a few kilometres from North Waziristan Agency's main town of Miranshah, late Wednesday night.
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