A security man was killed and another received injuries in a blast in Bara tehsil of Khyber Agency on Saturday. Officials said that two personnel of Frontier Constabulary were critically injured when an improvised explosive device, planted along the roadside in Nawgazi Baba area of Shalobar in Bara, went off. They said that one of the injured security men succumbed to his injuries in a hospital. In Akkakhel area of Bara, militants blew up the house of Sohail Khan, a member of pro-government group, on Saturday. The incident is second of its kind during the last two days as two more houses were blown up by militants in the same area. In Mohmand Agency, unidentified militants blew up a primary school for girls in Khazeena area in tehsil Safi on Saturday. Dawn.
HOW do you win against an enemy who only needs to not lose? It`s a problem that has confounded counter-insurgency campaigns the world over, and it`s a problem the Pakistan Army is struggling to overcome in Fata. The army has figured out how to `clear` at least in terms of clusters of militants and they`ve managed to `hold` fairly well. They also know what comes next: `transfer` But that crucial step is proving trickier than perhaps imagined. Officially, the plan is to ramp up the civil administration and shore up the local forces. Have the khasadars and the levies take over policing responsibilities as and where possible and use the political agent`s office and the malik system to develop areas and win back hearts and minds. Dawn.
Security forces have regained control of Salarzai tehsil of Bajaur Agency as militants have fled Batwar and other areas along the border with Afghanistan, official sources said. An official told Dawn on Saturday that security forces backed by the Salarzai Qaumi Lashkar pushed back the militants who had sneaked into several areas of Pakistan from Afghanistan`s Kunar province. He said security forces fought against the Taliban for two weeks before the militants fled the areas. Dawn.
The Muttahida Qabail Party (MQP) has warned the internally displaced tribesmen will not return to their areas unless they are paid Rs3 million for each damaged house besides provision of basic necessities. The IDPs from Orakzai Agency held a jirga at Malik Saad Shaheed Park here on Saturday where they discussed problems and their solutions.MQP chairman Habib Noor Orakzai and secretary general Rafiullah alias Bhutto said they would go back to their areas only when the government provided health, education, road, water facilities, security and safety of their lives. They also demanded separate province for nearly 40 million population of the tribal region. Dawn.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has formally designated the Haqqani Network a ‘foreign terrorist organisation’ in her report to US Congress. Supporters of the move argued that this would help strangle its fundraising in Saudi Arabia and the UAE and pressurize the Pakistani military into launching a long-expected operation against the network, which is based within North Waziristan. Unfortunately, Pakistan Embassy’s response, which appeared in The Washington Post, has been that it was merely the USA’s internal matter and that the members of the network were not Pakistani citizens. The Nation.
What was looking increasingly inevitable has now come to pass, and the US on Friday finally designated the Haqqani network a ‘foreign terrorist organisation’ (FTO) after two years of what was said to be ‘spirited debate.’ The organisation was deemed to meet the statutory criteria under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) for listing as a FTO. Further, Secretary of State Hilary Clinton said that the Haqqani network would be a Specially Designated Global Terrorist entity under executive order 13224. There have been deep misgivings in the Obama White House about making such a move, particularly in light of the very fragile relationship the Americans have with us. The News.
A 14-year-old suicide bomber detonated explosives near the heavily barricaded NATO headquarters in Kabul on Saturday, killing six street children, a day after the United States moved to blacklist the Haqqani faction as a terrorist organization, NATO and local officials said. The bomber wore a vest packed with explosives and rode right up to the NATO gates on a bicycle, underscoring the insurgents’ ability to strike deep inside the Afghan capital, ahead of the withdrawal of most foreign combat forces by the end of 2014. Daily Times.
A man died of Congo virus in Shinwari Sheikhmalkhel on Saturday. Health teams have arrived in the area to gather information about the virus, a local person told. Yaseen, the 20-year-old victim suffering from high fever, was admitted to Khyber Teaching Hospital a few days prior to his death but couldn’t survive, sources said. The blood tests sent to the National Institute of Health in Islamabad testified the patient had Congo virus, a common disease found in animals, sources added. The incident marked the first such case recorded in Landikotal. staff report. Daily Times.
A woman was killed and her husband seriously injured in a firing incident in Karmna area of Landikotal. According to details, unidentified armed men raided a house and opened indiscriminate fire. Resultantly, the owner of the house, identified as Yarehman, sustained serious wounds while his wife was killed on the spot. Daily Times.
ALAM KHAN, NAWAF KHAN
