At least 22 Taliban militants were killed and scores wounded as Pakistani war planes kept up their relentless strikes on the bases of Tehrik-e-Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud in restive Waziristan, while police shot dead five other radicals in Karachi on Saturday.
"The operation will continue till the last Taliban militant is eliminated," Interior Minister Rehman Malik told media persons at the Islamabad airport on his return from the US. Malik's remarks come as Pakistani army and fighter jets resumed their pounding of Taliban positions after a nine hour pause ordered to lead the trapped civilians reach safer areas.
Blaming the Pakistan government for the killing of its chief Hakimullah Mehsud, Taliban has warned that it "will soon start targeting" the ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz leadership for its alleged support to the United States in the region.
Just two soldiers are known to have survived unscathed after the attack on the base.
Karzai has steadfastly opposed direct talks between the US and the Taliban, wanting Afghan ownership of the "reconciliation process", as the reintegration of the Taliban into the mainstream is referred to.
'We already have Indian Islamic extremist groups working in India, and secondly, if Pakistan slides even further, India will be sharing a border with the Taliban,' says Ahmed Rashid, perhaps the world's foremost expert on the Taliban.
A United States drone crashed in the restive South Waziristan tribal region of Pakistan on Sunday, with the Taliban claiming that its militants had shot down the unmanned spy plane.
The much anticipated peace talks between the Taliban and the United States might not happen as well, a US official said, as the Special US envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan left Qatar without any talks with the Afghan insurgent group.
The visit comes two days after Pakistan officials shared with the Chinese embassy the preliminary findings of their investigation into the attack.
Taliban chief Mullah Omar is dead, the Afghan government announced tonight, "confirming" reports about the one-eyed extremist leader who ruled the country with an iron fist between 1996 and 2001.
The US on Tuesday designated Maulana Fazlullah, the chief of Pakistani Taliban, as a global terrorist and slapped sanction against him.
Almost all mosques in villages in Buner district are being used by the Taliban to recruit local residents for their cause of enforcing Sharia or Islamic law in the Malakand division, which includes Swat, and the rest of the country, media reports said on Monday.
The United States has said that Taliban is not an enemy of America, a move seen as the latest effort of the Obama administration to send an olive branch to the terrorist outfit that ruled Afghanistan before 9/11.
There have been conflicting reports about whether Taliban's supreme council was consulted or not on the election
Mullah Naqibullah, the commander of Taliban's militia in Kandahar and his close colleague Mullah Abdul Qayum were reportedly among those arrested.
A confidential Spanish defence ministry report has alleged Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency helped arm the Taliban in 2005 for assassination plots against the Afghan government, media reports said. The confidential report, obtained by Cadena Ser radio and posted on the station's Web site, also alleges the Inter Services Intelligence helped the Taliban procure roadside bombs.
Some commanders have refused to pledge allegiance to Akhundzada, according to interviews with Taliban commanders and officials.
Acknowledging the killing of its leader Mullah Akhtar Mansour, the Afghan Taliban have announced Mawlawi Haibatullah Akhundzada as his successor.
Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud was among six militants killed in a US drone strike on Friday in the lawless North Waziristan tribal region.
The shocking footage of the shooting incident, which took place a few days back near the border of Orakzai tribal agency, was made available to a Pakistani media outlet on Friday.
Rejecting General David Petraeus' claim that thousands of Afghan Taliban have either 'laid down' their arms or moving towards doing so, Mullah Omer-led Taliban vowed continuing their war until the establishment of Islamic Emirate in Afghanistan.
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 reaction came a day after Pakistan's Interior Minister Rehman Malik said that India is providing funds for Taliban fighters located along the Afghanistan border for creating chaos in Pakistan.
India on Monday rejected the charge that it was fomenting unrest in Pakistan by funding Taliban fighters based along the border with Afghanistan.
