The Pakistani military on Friday claimed its forces have entered the important Taliban stronghold of Makeen in South Waziristan even as gunmen injured an army brigadier and his driver in an audacious attack in the federal capital.
Rejecting foreign media reports that Taliban supreme commander Mullah Omar and the central council of the terrorist organisation were present in Balochistan, Frontier Corps Balochistan Inspector General Major General Saleem Nawaz has said that they are not functioning from Quetta.
Asked if Pakistan can be an ally in the war on terror, Royce said, "I think the civilian government is."
The police also said that an initial probe has suggested that the banned terrorist group Islamic State of Iraq and Syria is behind the suicide attack that injured over 100 people in Khar, the capital of Bajaur tribal district.
United States Defence Secretary Leon Panetta has said that Al Qaeda is the primary enemy of United States in the Af-Pak region and those parts of the Taliban who support Al Qaeda is also American target.
Pakistan believes Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud, who has a $5 million U.S. bounty on his head, was probably killed with his wife and bodyguards in a missile attack two days ago. According to intelligence officer in South Waziristan Mehsud's funeral had already taken place, while Pakistani media cited their own security sources saying Mehsud was dead.
The Russian-made chopper, owned by the provincial government of Punjab, was on its way to Russia on routine maintenance when it suffered unknown technical glitch and had to force land in Azra district of restive Logar province on Thursday.
Against the backdrop of a spate of attacks on election meetings and campaign offices ahead of the landmark May 11 polls, Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan chief Hakimullah Mehsud has said his group is focussed on ending the country's democratic system.
The Pakistani Taliban have threatened to contaminate water sources and reservoirs with poisonous materials to pressure the army to stop military operations against them in South Waziristan tribal region. The cantonment boards of Rawalpindi and Chaklala, located near the federal capital, received the threat from the banned Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan.
The Pakistan government on Monday scrapped a controversial peace deal signed last month with the Taliban that had been bitterly opposed by the United States but the Taliban militia said it was still holding the truce.
The explosion took place at 4 pm at the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl workers' convention in Khar, the capital of Bajaur tribal district.
Pakistani security forces believe that the new Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud is already dead and the terrorist group is using his "lookalike brother" for media interviews to give an impression that he is alive, media reports in Islamabad claimed.
A group of clerics today asked the government not to hold peace with the banned Pakistani Taliban after it condoned the recent bomb attack on a church in Peshawar that killed over 80 people.
In his Ramzan message, the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan commander Hakimullah Mehsud has called upon mujahideen's to put aside their differences. Tahir Ali reports from Islamabad.
A top Taliban commander has threatened to carry out attacks on nine more key installations in Pakistan similar to the strike on Mehran Naval Base in Karachi to avenge the death of Osama bin Laden.
The United States embassy in Pakistan has warned about a possible terrorist attack against American citizens at the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad and prohibited American staff from visiting the five-star facility, an official statement said.
Acknowledging that his government had underestimated the threat from Taliban, Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari said the terrorist group was present in "huge amounts of land" in the country extending its reach beyond the tribal belt to larger cities like Peshawar.
Hundreds of Taliban fighters on Friday carried out fresh attacks in a remote area in northwest Pakistan bordering Afghanistan though security forces claimed to have regained control of the region after fierce fighting that killed nearly 80 people, including 28 troops.
The Taliban has vowed to launch more "high-profile" attacks against government and military installations in Pakistan.
Pakistani authorities agreed during talks with Afghan peace negotiators toc release several Afghan Taliban prisoners to give a push to Kabul's troubled reconciliation process, according to a media report.
A video showing Azizuddin, asking the Pakistan government to meet the demands of his abductors, including the release of some Taliban cadres, was aired by the Al Arabiya TV channel on Saturday. The militants holding Azizuddin, his driver and bodyguard had demanded the release of Taliban leader Mullah Obaidullah Akhund. They have also demanded the release of five or six other Pakistani and Afghan militants held by Pakistani authorities.
The United States on Wednesday warned that Pakistan faces a "serious" threat from the Taliban and offered its assistance to fight against terrorism after the recent attacks in Karachi.
India has much paranoia in India about a new 'Terroristan' coming up between Pakistan and a Taliban-ruled Afghanistan. Pakistan has zero ability economically, diplomatically, geostrategically or militarily to create one. If they try, it will be great for India as they will destroy themselves yet again, asserts Shekhar Gupta.
Police in Pakistan's restive Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province said on Monday that an initial probe has suggested that the banned terrorist group Islamic State is behind the suicide attack on a political convention of a hardline Islamist party that killed at least 46 people and injured over 100.
Taliban leader Mullah Mansour was killed in a United States airstrike.
Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi on Monday dismissed a report that the Inter-Services Intelligence agency is funding, training and guiding the Taliban in Afghanistan as "rubbish", saying Talibanisation is not good for both countries.
Pakistan's Tehreek-e-Taliban is not only trying to overthrow the government in Islamabad, but is also launching attack against other countries, including the US, Defence Secretary Robert Gates said on Friday.
Banned Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan's operational commander and an unidentified foreigner have been arrested by intelligence operatives in the restive Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, according to a media report on Thursday.
At least 30 militants were killed and 15 others injured in the air strikes in Pandiali area of Mohmand Agency, sources close to the security forces said.
A Pakistani court gave three weeks to the federal government to submit a detailed reply on the status of 10 high-profile Afghan Taliban leaders who are in the custody of authorities.
Pakistani troops on Sunday captured a strategic mountaintop and pushed deeper into Taliban-held territory after consolidating their hold on areas around the hometown of Hakimullah Mehsud in Waziristan, where 15 rebels and a soldier were killed in fresh fighting.
Revelations by Pakistani-American David Headley, a Lashkar-e-Tayiba operative charged with conspiring in the 26/11 Mumbai attacks, may have prompted Islamabad to finally go after the Afghan-Taliban, a noted United States scholar on South Asia has said.
Concerns that Afghanistan and India became too close in the post-2001 period was one reason why Pakistan was reluctant to act against Taliban and Al Qaeda, according to a report, which recommends engagement with the militants to end the conflict in the restive nation.
Describing the Pakistani Army's offensive against the Taliban and other extremist groups as "terrific", US Defence Secretary Robert Gates has assured Islamabad that Washington would keep supporting the troubled nation in future also.
Blaming the American private military company Blackwater and Pakistani secret agencies for the suicide attacks in International Islamic University in Islamabad and the deadliest attack in Khyber bazaar in Peshawar that claimed a number innocent of lives, Qari Hussain, commander of Tehrik Taliban Pakistan said that it is an attempt to malign the Taliban and warned that militants would avenge 'the killing of innocent people within few days.'
External Affairs Minister S M Krishna said India considers Taliban as a dreaded terror outfit, and wants Pakistan to take action against it along with other groups like Lashkar-e-Tayiba and Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD).
America's Central Intelligence Agency has taken its war against Taliban and the Al Qaeda from the mountainous Af-Pak border region to the bases in Pakistan's Peshawar and Quetta cities, a media report said on Thursday. The report by the New York Times said that the agencies that have previously shared a 'tormented relationship', are now working on the several reconnaissance missions together.
Pakistan has released 14 Afghan Taliban cadres, including 'commander' Anwar Haq Mujahid, and may consider a request by Afghan peace negotiators to free Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, to kick-start the Afghan reconciliation process. The 14 Afghan Taliban cadres were freed in two phases.
Dreaded Islamic State militant group has appointed a breakaway Taliban commander as its chief in Khurasan, a historic name used by militants for an area covering Afghanistan, Pakistan and parts of India.
Three people were killed and seven others injured.
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