Pakistan-based terrorist outfit Tehrik-e-Taliban could target Indian installations near the border areas, said Aditya Mishra, Inspector General (Frontier) of the Border Security Force.
The Taliban will view India through the eyes of the ISI and can be relied upon to undertake hostile actions against this country, warns Virendra Kapoor.
ISI chief Faiz Hameed coerced the Taliban to announce an interim government guaranteed to preserve Pakistan's control over the levers of power in Kabul, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
There is growing acceptance of the idea in the international community that engaging the Taliban government is a far better approach than ostracising it, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Women petition the Taliban. Talibs patrol Kabul's streets. Afghans flee into Pakistan.
In the second major strike in the last four days, American drones on Monday targeted a Taliban hideout in Pakistan's restive Kurram tribal region, killing at least 15 people and wounding several others. The drone fired two missiles at the hideout, where a meeting of the banned Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan was being held, TV channels reported. There was no official word on the incident. This was the first such attack in Kurram Agency.
Burqa-clad Taliban militants on Monday stormed a police station used by local intelligence personnel at Bannu in northwest Pakistan and took several hostages, before security men stormed the building to end the siege. Four Taliban fighters were killed and another captured following a heavy exchange of fire.
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.
But tactics adopted by them are similar to terrorism!!!
The Taliban have confirmed that Pakistan's powerful intelligence chief Lieutenant General Faiz Hameed has met its de facto leader Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, amidst efforts by the insurgent group to finalise a government in Afghanistan.
Blinken said the US will continue to act against those who threaten the country, its people and its allies.
During the day-long visit, the Pakistani delegation will hold talks with Afghanistan's acting Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi and call on leadership of the interim government in Kabul and other Afghan leaders, according to Foreign Office.
Afghanistan may be faced with some off-field distractions in Pakistan with Group B rivals England and South Africa being urged to boycott their matches.
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At least 15 militants were killed on Tuesday when Pakistani fighter jets pounded targets in the country's northwestern tribal region, a day after a brazen Taliban assault on Karachi airport.
Pakistan's efforts for the peace process in Afghanistan would be remembered for long, he said.
Pakistan's national flag-carrier on Monday ran its first commercial flight to Kabul since the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan in mid-August.
Expressing concern over the Islamabad government's failure in curbing terrorism, a prominent Pakistani jurist has said that the country should focus on 'Taliban instead of rivalry with India'. Pakistan has failed to curb terrorism and the government is incapable to deal with the looming threat posed by Taliban and other extremists, senior Supreme Court lawyer Abid Hassan Minto said. Minto said that the Pakistani military and political leaders should fight internal extremists.
Former Indian diplomats on Monday termed the Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan as a "setback" for India strategically, and asserted that the priority for New Delhi right now should be to evacuate its citizens from the war-torn nation.
Pakistani Taliban commanders have stepped up anti-India rhetoric in the wake of tension between the two countries and offered their men and suicide bombers to fight alongside the armed forces in the event of hostilities on the eastern frontier.Militant commanders have called on Pakistan's security establishment to end military operations against the Taliban in the tribal areas, following the terrorist attacks in Mumbai.
Azizullah Fazli has been re-named chairman of the Afghanistan Cricket Board (ACB) in the first major development in the game's national governing body since the Taliban took control of the nation.
According to the Inter-Services Public Relations, the media wing of the army, the terrorists attacked the security post in Dera Ismail Khan's Daraban area bordering the South Waziristan tribal district in the early morning hours.
Pakistan may want to undertake a 'false flag' operation in J&K to divert attention from the situation in Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa but infiltrating one SSG battalion into J&K and having two SSG battalions waiting to follow suit means war, which Pakistan cannot afford in its current economic crisis, notes Lieutenant General Prakash Katoch (retd).
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken was asked by US Congressmen if the US had explore the possibility of northwest India for counter terrorism capabilities in Afghanistan. Blinken's remarks on India assume great importance, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar
A senior Taliban commander, wanted in connection with an assassination bid on Malala Yousafzai's life, has been found using networking site LinkedIn, listing his skills as "jihad and journalism".
'China is a friendly country and we welcome it for reconstruction and developing Afghanistan'
Acting on an intelligence tip-off, security agencies have nabbed the Punjab chief of the banned Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), Khalilullah, along with a trained suicide bomber.
"The war in Afghanistan is over, now we will work together to rebuild this country," said Taliban spokesperson Zabiullah Mujahid at a press conference in Kabul.
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.
Less than two days after the Taliban announced the launch of their official website hosting videos, a magazine, and its leaders' interviews and statements, it was taken down on Monday.
During his visit, Musharraf had assured that a peace deal he struck with tribal leaders will not diminish the hunt for the leaders of Al Qaeda and the Taliban or their training camps.
Taliban insurgents disguised as police attacked a prison holding hundreds of militants in northwest Pakistan with rockets and mortars and have reportedly escaped with 300 prisoners after a gunfight with security forces.
'The really striking thing is that the Taliban has suo moto presented to us certain firm benchmarks against which it expects us to hold to account the Taliban rulers's actions in the period ahead' notes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
The meeting was attended by a group of Taliban leaders where JeM sought their support in 'India-Centric' operations. All states have been alerted to conduct security drills and keep anti-terror units on high alert.
US Defence Secretary Robert Gates has said Taliban and Al Qaeda are using Pakistan's tribal areas particularly north Waziristan to regroup, a problem the US is trying to address with Islamabad.
Once Mazar-i-Sharif falls, some isolate pockets of resistance may remain, which the Taliban would tackle through political work or coercion, asserts Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
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.
Pakistani negotiators on Monday cancelled a scheduled meeting with the Taliban after the insurgents claimed they had killed 23 soldiers kidnapped by them in 2010, dealing a severe blow to the fledgling peace process.
The Biden administration expects the Modi government to continue to remain as its loyal camp follower even as Washington continues to act in self-interests, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Regional States will be worried that the US's nascent engagement with the Taliban behind the fig leaf of humanitarian aid enables the return of US intelligence personnel to Afghanistan, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
In a surprise move, Pakistan's powerful intelligence chief Lieutenant General Faiz Hameed on Saturday dashed to Kabul, amidst the Taliban struggling to finalise and install an inclusive government in Afghanistan that would be acceptable to the international community.
