The recent attacks in Pakistan's Punjab should be taken as warning shots of an impending battle which will further destabilise that country and the region.
According to sources, the Pashtun army officer came from the SSG, to which Pervez Musharraf belonged and which was specially trained by the US Special Forces for covert ops.
In a revelation, the Newsweek magazine claims in its upcoming issue that the recent suicide attacks in Pakistan following the storming of Lal Masjid by the army to flush out militants were ordered by Zawahiri.
After militants launched attacks on army posts and tried to blow up an army convoy, the military pressed helicopter gun ships to bombard their hideouts in the area, for the first time in recent months.
Militants in Pakistan's restive tribal areas carried out the two attacks apparently as a retaliation to the bloody Lal Masjid crackdown.
Security at sensitive installations, including places of worship, airports, government offices and international missions, has been beefed up.
The country's volatile tribal areas were turned into virtual killing fields in three different suicide attacks.
The attack is being seen as a possible fallout of the recent Army crackdown on the pro-Taliban Lal Masjid in Islamabad.
Islamic militants have launched a spate of attacks in the province since the mosque operation that has left at least 30 people dead though security has been tightened across the country due to fears of extremist backlash.
Khalil, who figured in India's list of most wanted terrorists, was a close aide of Ghazi and used by the government negotiators to hold talks with Ghazi on Monday night.
Officials said security forces used light weapons to demolish the boundary walls of the complex and clear other hurdles to observe the movement of militants. "Calculated shots were fired at the obstacles," an official source said.
On Thursday, the government rejected Ghazi's offer to leave the mosque with his followers if he was granted a safe passage of the kind provided by India to Pakistani militants during Kargil war.
The bloody stand-off between security forces and the militants, headed by Gazi, entered the fourth day on Friday as government spurned all kinds of demands by Ghazi.
Ten people, including six security personnel, were killed and five others injured on Wednesday in two separate attacks on army and police vehicles in Pakistan, which officials suspect could be a fallout of the crackdown on Lal Masjid clerics.
The death toll in the deadly suicide bombing near the Lal Masjid in Islamabad rose to 20 with a policeman succumbing to his injuries on Monday even as Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani said the attack was aimed at destabilising Pakistan.
The tribals, many of whose children, particularly girls, were killed during the raid, have hit back with ferocious vengeance at the Pakistan Army, paramilitary forces and the police deployed in the Pashtun belt as well as outside.
'Bangalore is a second wake-up call about Wahabisation of some Muslim youth -- educated types. First was in Mumbai a year ago.'
Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz said the government would allow Ghazi to be held under house arrest with his ailing mother if he surrenders and frees the trapped women and children.
Unidentified militants fired at the president's aircraft as it was taking off from the Chakala air base.
Several students said they would never return to the madrassa, even if conditions return to normal.
The storm will wreak havoc not just in Pakistan but around the world, which still has its eyes tightly shut to the silent revolution sweeping through Pakistan.
Aziz vowed to enforce Sharia in the country even if the government did not itself do so, saying the Sharia would be enforced at any cost for which the whole nation should support the mosque's management.
As is clear to the West as well, Pakistan is at the crossroads.
A generation has passed and the demolition appears to be a story of a era gone by, says Rediff.com's Sharat Pradhan, who shares his experience as a witness in court in the Babri Masjid demolition case.
A generation has passed and the demolition appears to be a story of an era gone by, says Sharat Pradhan, who shares his experience as a witness in court in the Babri Masjid demolition case. On the 25th anniversary of the Babri Masjid demolition, we republish this 2011 special.
The Jammu and Kashmir police on Friday arrested social activist Waqar H Bhatti for allegedly hurting religious sentiments with his Shivling tweet which caused social media outrage.
No one has taken responsibility for the attack.
A Pakistani court on Friday issued non-bailable arrest warrant against former military dictator Pervez Musharraf and ordered police to present him in the court in the murder case of Lal Masjid cleric Abdul Rashid Ghazi, who was killed in a military operation in 2007.
Most politicians and even non-politicians have been honoured because of what they were purported to be electorally worth for the ruling party of their time, argues N Sathiya Moorthy.
Mobs killed a cleric in a late night attack on a mosque, torched an eatery and vandalised shops as communal violence that began in Haryana's Nuh spilled over into Gurugram, taking the death toll to five, the police said on Tuesday.
Pakistan's new Army Chief has begun setting the stage to act against groups like LeT and JeM
After initial hiccups, Pakistani state negotiators and a Taliban-nominated committee met at an undisclosed location on Thursday to frame a roadmap for parleys aimed at ending terrorism and bringing peace to the country.
With Ayodhya issue stuck in the quicksand of political and legal quagmire, a retired high court judge is spearheading a movement to resolve the issue peacefully and has claimed to have got the backing of over seven thousand locals -- both Hindus and Muslims.
On October 5, 2019, the sessions court hearing the matter had said that as per Supreme Court orders, all evidence has to be presented before December 24, 2019, which would be the last working day.
The BJP on Thursday alleged that the opposition parties have decided to boycott the inauguration of the new Parliament building by Prime Minister Narendra Modi just because it has been built at his initiative.
Murli Manohar Joshi makes a rare public appearance.
'Now they're talking about changing the Constitution; they feel they have no reason now to hide their intentions.'
Learning perhaps from the Kargil debacle, Musharraf tried hard to evolve as a statesman in his dealings with India, recalls Rana Banerji, who headed the Pakistan desk at RA&W.
Authorities in Pakistan have frozen bank accounts with more than Rs 400 million of over 5,100 terror suspects, including JeM chief Masood Azhar who is under "protective custody" after the terror attack on the Pathankot air base, officials said.
According to trust sources, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief Mohan Bhagwat , Maharashtra Chief Minister Udhav Thackeray and Bihar CM Nitish Kumar are also on the list of invitees.
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