Quetta bombing: Countrywide protests enter third day

Source : The Express Tribune

Families of the Quetta blast victims continued their sit-in for the third day in Hazara Town and Alamdar Road on Tuesday, refusing to bury their loved ones, Express News reported.

To express solidarity with the Shia Hazaras in Quetta, several protests and sits-in across the country also continued after the government failed to fulfill the demands of the Hazara community.

In Lahore, many roads were blocked, including the GT Road and motorway interchanges, causing inconvenience to transporters. A sit-in was also being held at Shahdara Chowk.

The Majlis-e-Wehdat-e-Muslameen (MWM) members continued their sit-in outside Governor House in Lahore, demanding those involved in the blast to be arrested.

Streets in Karachi also remained deserted while private schools were closed. Several areas, including Ancholi and Ayesha Manzil, were blocked as protesters burnt tyres. Shia Ulema Council and MWM in Karachi said that they would continue with their sits-in till their demands are met.

Awami National Party’s (ANP) Ameer Nawab and Bashir Jaan came to the sit-in in Karachi to express solidarity with the protesters.

In Patel Para protesters opened fire at the police after the funeral was held for one of the four people killed in last night’s firing in the area. The police resorted to aerial gunfire and shelling to disperse the protesters.

On February 16, a massive bomb ripped though a busy market in a Shia Hazara neighbourhood of Quetta, killing more than 80 people and injuring nearly 200.

Pakistan tests another nuclear-capable missile

Source : Pakistan News

Islamabad, Feb. 15 (Xinhua-ANI): Pakistan on Friday tested a missile that can carry nuclear warheads, the second such test in a week, the military said.

"Pakistan today successfully test-fired the Short Range Surface to Surface Ballistic Missile Hatf II (Abdali), as part of the process of validation of land based ballistic missile systems," an army statement said.

Hatf II (Abdali), with a range of 180 km, can carry nuclear as well as conventional warheads with high accuracy.

The test was witnessed by Chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee, General Khalid Shameem Wynne, Director General Strategic Plans Division Lieutenant General (Retd) Khalid Ahmed Kidwai, Commander Army Strategic forces Command, Lieutenant General Tariq Nadeem Gilani, senior officers from the strategic forces and scientists and engineers of strategic organizations.

The president and prime minister of Pakistan have congratulated the scientists and engineers on this outstanding achievement which consolidates Pakistan's deterrence capability both at the operational and strategic levels, the statement said.

It was the second missile test by Pakistan in a week.

On Monday, Pakistani military said it had conducted a successful test fire of a short range Surface to Surface Missile Hatf IX (NASR), which has a range of 60 km and can carry nuclear warheads.

Pakistan, which tested nuclear tests in 1998 in response to Indian tests, has several missile series. (Xinhua-ANI)

Pakistan Taliban says American, British fighters killed

Source : Pakistan News

ISLAMABAD (AFP) - The Pakistani Taliban have included a Briton and an American in a slideshow of fighters killed in battle that also eulogises Al-Qaeda mastermind Osama bin Laden.According to the US monitoring service SITE, the 12-minute, 56-second video was posted on jihadist websites on February 6 and was prepared by Umar Studio, the media wing of Pakistan's umbrella Tehreek-e-Taliban (TTP) faction.It identifies the American by the name of Inaam and the Briton as Abbas, whom SITE said had been identified by the TTP in a prior video as Omar al-Britani and who gave a speech in English.No date ..

Pakistani leader to talk with Afghan Taliban in Qatar

Source : Pakistan News

Pakistani political leader Maulana Fazlur Rehman has gone on a "private visit" to Qatar to hold talks with the Afghan Taliban, a media report said Sunday.

Rehman, the chief of the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam (F), was playing a "pivotal role" in the Afghan peace process, party leader Hafiz Hussain Ahmed was quoted as saying by the Dawn.

Ahmed said the use of force was not a solution to the conflict between the Taliban and the military, and urged them to sit on the negotiating table to restore peace in the region.

The leader also urged the Pakistani government and the army to take seriously the offer for talks by the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan.

JUI-F spokesman Abdul Jalil Jan, however, only said that Rehman had gone abroad on a "private visit".

Western media reports say the US is in contact with the Taliban in Qatar to persuade the outfit to initiate negotiations with the Afghan government, as Washington prepares for the withdrawal of troops by 2014.

Another party leader, Sirajul Haq, said the Pakistani government was looking towards the US for a "signal" after the negotiation offer by the Taliban.

"The government is not sincere in peace negotiations and is waiting for dictation from Americans," he said.

He said if the US could hold talks with the Taliban, there was no reason why Pakistan could not do so.

6 killed in U.S. drone strike in NW Pakistan

Source : Xinhua | English.news.cn

ISLAMABAD, Feb. 8 (Xinhua) -- At least six people were killed and two others injured on Friday evening as a U.S. drone attacked a house in the northwestern tribal region of Pakistan, local media reported.

Local Urdu TV channel Express News reported that the unmanned aircraft targeted a house in the Babar Ghar village that lies at the border of North Waziristan and South Waziristan, Pakistan's two volatile tribal regions bordering Afghanistan.

According to the reports, the drone fired two missiles at the house and killed six people inside besides injuring two others.

The house was completely destroyed in the attack.

Local people rushed to the site and pulled out the bodies and injured from the rubbles.

Friday's attack is the 8th of its kind in Pakistan's northwestern tribal areas since the start of the current year. So far this year at least 53 people have been killed in such strikes.

Nothing can stop Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline

Source : Islamic Invitation Turkey

Pakistan Ambassador to Tehran says nothing can prevent the progress of the multi- billion-dollar Iran-Pakistan (IP) gas pipeline project.

Khalid Aziz Babar said on Wednesday that based on an agreement signed between the two parties, the gas pipeline must be completed by December 2014 and after its completion, gas transfer from Iran to Pakistan will start.

On January 29, an Iranian deputy oil minister said Tehran would finance and help build the 700-kilometer tranche of Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline on the Pakistani side.

“Aside from a 250-million-dollar loan, Iran will also provide the supplies and equipment necessary for the construction of the part of the pipeline on Pakistani soil,” Javad Owji, who is also managing director of the National Iranian Gas Company, said.

This is while Pakistan has constantly dismissed rumors that it might pull out of the project amid efforts by the United States to convince the country to abandon the pipeline.

The pipeline, projected to cost about USD1.2-1.5 billion, would enable the export of 21.5 million cubic meters of Iran’s natural gas to Pakistan on a daily basis.

Iran has already built more than 900 kilometers of the pipeline on its soil.

Pakistan Warns US Not to Cross Red Line

Source : Fars News Agency

TEHRAN (FNA)- Pakistan's ambassador to the United States blasted the Obama administration for continued drone strikes in Fata, calling the violation a "red line" that should not be crossed.

At a breakfast meeting with the Christian Science Monitor staff, Sherry Rehman said that drones strikes were "a clear violation of our sovereignty and a violation of international law" that threatened stable relations between the two governments, Dawn reported.

She rejected persistent media reports that Pakistan tacitly approved the strikes while denouncing them publicly as untrue. "Let me assure you that since we have been in government, there has been no quiet complicity, no question of wink and nod," she said.

The United States has launched hundreds of drone strikes in Fata, killing dozens of militant leaders. Pakistan says that the drones also have killed a large number of innocent civilians.

Pakistan warns that the civilian deaths are counter-productive as they increase public sympathy for the militants and wants the United States to stop the strikes.

The drone strategy "creates more potential terrorists on the ground and militants on the ground instead of taking them out," the ambassador said. "We need to drain the swamp, but instead it is radicalising people."

Ambassador Rehman complained that the United States had failed to appreciate Pakistan's domestic terrorism problems and counter-terrorism operations, which have cost nearly 50,000 military and civilian lives and billions of dollars in expenditures and lost income over the past decade.