The Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan has held both India and Pakistan responsible for the 'unrest in Kashmir' and has vowed to liberate and establish Islamic Shariah there.
'It is important for India that the world also recognises ISI as an organisation that promotes terrorism. If this does not happen the problem will remain,' he said.
Al Qaeda terrorist Ilyas Kashmiri's role in India would largely depend on how Pakistan's ISI plans to use him, say Intelligence Bureau sources. Vicky Nanjappa reports.
The United States on Thursday stepped up its campaign targeting Al Qaeda and Taliban militants in Pakistan's restive northwestern tribal region as missiles from CIA-operated drones killed eights suspected insurgents.
'The Afghans used to say that if there is any person whose name should be taken after Allah, it is Hindustani.'
The blast occurred in the mosque in the Police Lines area around 1.40 pm when a suicide bomber present in the front row during the Zuhr (afternoon) prayers blew himself up, security officials said.
United States authorities have described Pakistan's powerful Inter-Services Intelligence agency as a terrorist organisation and considered it as much of a threat as the Al Qaeda and the Taliban, according to a secret document which also names Lashkar-e-Tayiba, Jaish-e-Mohammed and Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami.
After the Afghan and Pakistani Talibans, the LeT and the LeJ, the most capable and lethal terrorist organisation today is the Al Qaeda of Arabian Peninsula, says B Raman
Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence had chalked out a "low-profile routine proxy operation" in India through the Lashkar-e-Tayiba but the plan was "hijacked" and turned into Mumbai attacks by an ex-Pakistan army major and terrorist Ilyas Kashmiri's men with Al Qaeda's blessings, according to a book written by slain journalist Syed Saleem Shahzad.
The Al Qaeda terrorist havens in Pakistan will be dismantled through "the combination of military operations -- aggressive military operations on the Afghan side -- and working energetically with the Pakistani government to shut down these safe havens."
According to a report in 'The Guardian', the recent arrests in Pakistan, which appear to have sparked security alerts in Britain and the US, followed months of work against Al Qaeda suspects in the region.
Pakistan will have to decide on the issue of conducting a joint operation with the United States against Taliban and the Al Qaeda leaders like Mullah Omar and Ayman al-Zawahiri if they are found in the country, AmericanAmbassador Cameron Munter said on Monday.
A 56-year old British cleric has been sentenced to life in prison by a court in US after being convicted of 11 terror-related charges, including providing material support to Al Qaeda and conspiring to establish a terrorist training camp in the US.
'You are dealing with a small gang of semi-literate terrorists. These are guys flying kites.' 'There is huge difference between flying kites and actually having a deliverable, executable, plan.'
"We know that Pakistan matters not just because it is the location for the Afghanistan Taliban leadership; it is also important in its own right. It's the base for Al Qaeda, it is a nuclear weapons state with the long-term risk of radicalisation," Miliband said in his testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which had convened a special hearing on Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Nine years after their mysterious disappearance following the toppling of the Taliban in Afghanistan, the US still believes the two top Al Qaeda leaders Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri are in hiding in northwestern Pakistan.
The United States may mount special operations to strike Taliban and Al Qaeda targets in Pakistan and also step up drone attacks against them in the near future, according to an American intelligence think-tank.Contending that the bulk of Al Qaeda leadership is now in Pakistan and not in Afghanistan, the Stratfor, in its annual security forecast, said this could prompt "Increased cross- border US military activity -- mostly drone strikes, but also Special Forces Operations.
Supporting United States General McChrystal's plan to send additional troops to Afghanistan, a former American general on Wednesday told the US lawmakers that there should be no Afghan 'exit strategy' till the Al Qaeda leadership currently based in Pakistan is eliminated.
Acknowledging that deferent terrorist outfits are becoming more linked with each other which could lead to the revival of the Al Qaeda and Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan, a United States military commander has underlined the need for a "combination of effort" to prevent them from regaining the "epicentre".
At least 200 religious scholars in Pakistan have issued a fatwa terming suicide attacks as "un-Islamic" and said the Islamic governments are bound to crush rebel groups like the Taliban, ISIS and Al-Qaeda.
Noting that it is terrorism that poses threat to Pakistan and not India, US President Barack Obama said on Monday that his administration would not hesitate from striking inside Pakistan if it had actionable intelligence against top Al Qaeda and Taliban leaders.
Contradicting Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari's claims, United States President Barack Obama has suggested that Osama bin Laden is still alive and he is operating under the assumption that the Al Qaeda leader is not dead. Addressing a town hall meeting in the central state of Missouri, the US President also reiterated his administration's position that Al-Qaeda and the Taliban "are the single most direct threat to our national security interests."
Former Inter-Services Intelligence official Khalid Khawaja, considered to be a close friend of Al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden, has exposed the murky deals between the spy agency, the Pakistan army, the militants.Khawaja, a former air force squadron leader, claims that he was captured by militants while trying to finalise a deal between them and the army. According to him, the ISI had sent him to North Waziristan to broker a deal between the militants and the Pakistan army.
In a stern warning to Pakistan, President Barack Obama on Tuesday asserted that his administration will not allow "safe havens" for Al Qaeda and Taliban terrorists operating with "impunity" in tribal areas bordering Afghanistan. "My bottom line is that we cannot allow Al Qaeda to operate. We cannot have those safe havens in that region," Obama said in his first press conference after assuming office on January 20.
China on Monday expressed the hope that the Taliban will stand by its commitment of establishing an "open and inclusive" Islamic government in Afghanistan and will ensure a peaceful transition of power without violence and terrorism.
The Islamic State has emerged as the most potent terrorist threat globally but in the Afghan-Pak region the space is dominated by other terrorist groups like Taliban, Haqqani network and Lashkar-e-Tayiba, America's top spymaster has said.
Ever since September 11, 2001, the Bush administration has used billions of dollars of aid and heavy political pressure to encourage General Pervez Musharraf to carry out more aggressive military operations against militants in the tribal areas. But the sporadic military campaigns Pakistan has conducted there have had little success, resulting instead in heavy losses among Pakistani Army units and anger among local residents.
"They support terror operations in India with terrorist organisations. They support the Haqqani network and the Taliban in conducting operations against the United States and NATO and Afghanistan. They've got blood all over their hands with the casualties," General (Retd) Jack Keane said.
Pakistan, which recently witnessed a series of suicide attacks by pro-Taliban and al Qaeda militants, is the most dangerous country in the world and has become a safe haven for terrorists, says a report. "Pak has everything Osama bin Laden could ask for: political instability, a trusted network of radical Islamists, an abundance of angry anti-Western recruits, secluded training areas and security services that don't always do what they're supposed to do," says the magazine.
A majority of Pakistanis favour their government not fighting Al Qaeda and Taliban and view United States as the greatest threat to their personal safety, according to a survey by a US agency.Almost three-quarter of Pakistanis who participated in the poll opined that embattled President Pervez Musharraf should resign and if he doesn't, he should be removed by the Parliament.The survey, conducted across Pakistan, also said that the Al Qaeda has gained public support.
That al-Qaeda-linked Haqqani militant network and Pakistan's military and intelligence establishment are working in tandem with each other has been established with a recent statement by Sirajuddin Haqqani, the operational commander of the Haqqanis. Amir Mir reports.
On the heels of the capture of top Taliban commander Mulla Baradar, Pakistani intelligence has also nabbed two other prominent renegades who are being grilled to trace the whereabouts of elusive Al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden and Taliban supremo Mulla Omar.
Countries in the region like Afghanistan, Pakistan and Maldives face serious existential threats from a mix of terrorist groups active in the region and elsewhere
The United States on Monday assured India that its concerns over Taliban insurgents gaining legitimacy without severing their terror links will neither be "overlooked or undermined" during the talks with the Islamic fundamentalist group.
While confirming that the voice in the slideshow was that of Moosa, senior police officials did not rule out the possibility that the banned IS terror group was trying to create a base in the Valley.
Badruddin Haqqani, the key operational commander of the Al Qaeda linked Haqqani network, and top Pakistani Taliban commander Mullah Dadullah are believed to have been killed in US drone and air strikes in the tribal region of Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Following the death of top Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan members, a comparatively weakened Pakistani Taliban are ready to hold peace talks with a government that is increasingly seen at odds with the United States. Amir Mir reports from Islamabad.
Rahimullah Yusufzai, also a senior journalist, told rediff.com that it cannot be said that recent violence in Pakistan was orchestrated by the Al Qaeda -- led by Osama bin Laden and his right hand man Ayman Al-Zawahiri.
"We don't have any evidence that Osama is in Pakistan," Interior Minister Aftab Khan Sherpao told reporters.
