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.
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.
Pakistani authorities have released 12 Taliban prisoners in the restive Swat valley as a goodwill gesture in the wake of a peace deal signed by the North West Frontier Province government and religious hardliners.
Seven militants were killed and two others injured when Pakistani security forces used gunship helicopters and artillery to target Taliban positions near Kohat town in the troubled North West Frontier Province today.
Over 100 Taliban fighters crossed over from Afghanistan and attacked military posts in Upper Dir area of northwest Pakistan, triggering clashes that left eight soldiers and 15 militants dead, officials said on Monday.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Monday said there was a sea change in the attitude of Pakistanis in the last one year and appreciated the military actions being taken by its army against the Taliban militants.
Taliban appears to be nearing collapse as in another blow to the group, Pakistani authorities have captured Mulla Abdul Kabir, a member of the Quetta Shura and the shadow governor of Afghanistan's eastern Nangahar province.
Moving from street to street, Pakistani troops on Sunday captured several key areas in Swat valley's main town Mingora from Taliban as their offensive to regain the control of the restive tribal region entered the decisive phase.
Musharraf also demanded that coalition fighting Taliban help spread economic development in Pashtun areas to wean them away from the Taliban and ensure that they do not join them.
The Taliban on Monday warned the Pakistan government not to release American national Raymond Davis, who allegedly shot dead two men in Lahore in January, saying any official involved in a move to free him would be killed by militants. "Any Pakistani government official playing any role in Davis' release will be killed by the Taliban," said Azam Tariq, spokesman for the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan. The Taliban have also demanded that Davis should be executed by the authorities.
Mullah Akhtar, a close aide of Mullah Omar who served as his deputy for the past three years, was chosen as the new leader.
Taliban's move came as Pakistani forces stepped up their campaign to retake territory in the districts of Buner, Dir and Swat. The military said they had killed more than 100 militants and lost several soldiers since fighting began on Tuesday.
The school at Badaber, 10 km south of Peshawar, was destroyed when militants set off six explosive devices. Police said at least 40 kg of explosives was used in the attack. No casualties were reported as the school was closed for the summer vacation.
The United States on Friday said that Pakistani leaders must take action against rapidly expanding Taliban militants who now pose an 'existential threat' to Islamabad. "I think that some of the leaders certainly understand that (threat posed by the Taliban), but it is important that they not only recognise it but take the appropriate actions to deal with it," United States Defence Secretary Robert Gates told reporters during his visit to Camp Lejeune in North Carolina.
Pakistan poses a 'bigger' security challenge than Afghanistan for the United States and the rest of the world, a top American diplomat has said. Christopher Dell, who currently runs the US embassy in Kabul, said Pakistani Taliban groups had formed a common front to attack North Atlantic Treaty Organisation troops in Afghanistan. "Pakistan is a bigger place, has a larger population, it's nuclear-armed. It has certainly made radical Islam a part of its political life," he said.
Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Tayiba is acting in a more Al Qaeda-like manner after being 'infected' by the ideas of Osama bin Laden's terror network and poses the highest risk to the United States, according to a top American counter-terrorism expert.
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.
Pakistani fighter jets pounded Taliban strongholds in the volatile South Waziristan tribal region on Friday as the death toll from the series of US drone attacks in the region rose to 13. The warplanes hit targets in preparation for a full scale military operation which Defence Minister Chaudhry Ahmed Mukhtar said would take off as soon as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan chief Baitullah Mehsud was spotted.
Security expert B Raman writes on the alarming rise of Taliban in Pakistan.
Ghulam Rasool Khan alias Khan Mirza, the Afghanistani national who was recently arrested in Purnia district in Bihar for his alleged links with the Taliban, holds a Pakistani passport.According to sources, police have recovered a Pakistani passport, issued in 2005, and a diary from Khan. Acting on a tip-off by the IB, the police arrested Khan in Purnia on January 13, and he was brought to Patna for further interrogation.
Several Pakistani security personnel were reportedly kidnapped by Taliban militants, who launched a pre-dawn attack on a security check post-near the Pakistani tribal region killing one personnel, local media reported. Two security personnel were also injured in the attack in Tank district in Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa province, TV channels reported. Express TV reported that the militants attacked a check-post of Frontier Corps at a remote Mulzai area.
The Pakistan Army on Wednesday said Faisal Shahzad, arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation for the failed bombing in New York's Times Square, is the son of a retired Air Vice Marshal.
Ayman al-Zawahiri, Al Qaeda's second most powerful leader after Osama Bin Laden, might be critically wounded and possibly dead, according to a media report.The CBS News reported that it had obtained a copy of an intercepted letter, which urgently requests a doctor to treat al-Zawahiri. The Al Qaeda leaders are believed to be hiding somewhere in Pakistan's tribal areas.
'People in Pakistan opened their homes and hearts to me because I was an Indian. I didn't feel alien at all and I felt as if I was in my own country.' 'I believe that there is a strong chance that the Taliban can win over Pakistan. In an era of ideological confusion these people (Taliban) thrive.' 'The Pakistani State is an enemy state not just for India but for Pakistan itself. By funding non-state actors, the Pakistani government is destroying itself.' Film-maker Hemal Trevedi speaks on her experiences when filming a documentary on Pakistani madrasas
Malala was dressed in Pakistani salwar kameez and dupatta. She was smiling and looked happy as he was greeted at the airport.
'Whatever comes in the minds of the Pakistani generals and Pakistan military, they just go for it.' 'They do not care about the consequences for their country or the consequences to the people of Pakistan.'
Umar Khalid, Maulana Fazlullah and Khan Said alias Sajna are under consideration for the top slot, the report said quoting sources.
With the Afghanistan government in Kabul approaching Islamabad for help in opening "reconciliation" talks with the Taliban, a Pakistani role in shaping the political landscape in Afghanistan is now an uncomfortable likelihood for New Delhi.
General Sharif will meet Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and other civil as well as military leaders during the day-long trip.
Taliban militants on Sunday attacked the Central Jail in Bannu and freed several of their comrades, including Adnan Rashid, a convict on death row who had plotted to kill General Pervez Musharraf. Tahir Ali reports
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.
A Muslim cleric in northwest Pakistan has been arrested under the tough anti-terrorism act for threatening to kill Malala Yousafzai in a suicide attack and instigating people against the Nobel Laureate for her recent comments on marriage, police said.
Amid efforts by the concerned governments to hold peace talks with them, the Pakistani and Afghan Taliban have said they would continue their "struggle" till "the Western inspired systems" of governance in both countries are overthrown.
Pakistan has informed the United States that it is ready to facilitate its peace talks with Taliban, but it must not be blamed in case of failure, as it does not spoon-feed the militant group, a media report said on Sunday.
Wakil Ahmed Muttawakil, the Taliban foreign minister when the Indian Airlines plane, IC-814, was hijacked from Kathmandu to Kandahar in December 1999, tells Jyoti Malhotra that India should not look at Afghanistan through the Pakistani lens.
Rescuers retrieved more bodies on Sunday from the burnt-out shell of the bombed Marriott Hotel in Islamabad, pushing the death toll from one of the worst terrorist attacks in the country to at least 60, including the Czech ambassador and an American.
Hakimullah Mehsud-led Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan believes that since all decisions of the Pakistani government are influenced by the army, his organization will only talk with negotiators who represent the military and not the government. Tahir Ali reports
The Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan has urged the Mehsud tribesmen of South Waziristan to leave their homes, claiming that the Taliban is in a state of war with the government of Pakistan.
A Taliban plot to target a flag-hoisting ceremony at the Wagah land border with India was foiled with the arrest of 10 people, including a top militant commander, Pakistani security agencies claimed on Friday.
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