Free Republic

Pakistan’s fledging democracy faced its first and greatest challenge last weekend. A suicide bomber driving a truck loaded with more than 1,000 pounds of explosives blew himself up early Saturday evening outside Islamabad’s luxury Marriott Hotel, killing 53 people and wounding several hundred. Most of the dead were Muslim guests who were breaking their day-long, Ramadan fast in the hotel restaurant when the bombing occurred.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — A huge explosion ripped through part of the heavily guarded Marriott Hotel in Pakistan's capital Saturday, damaging buildings in a wide radius, killing at least two people and wounding at least 25.

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) -- The perpetrators of this week's deadly car bombing at Jakarta's Marriott Hotel trained with al-Qaida in Afghanistan and Pakistan, Indonesia's defense minister said, adding that there are many more terrorists still in the country. Matori Abdul Djalil said that the bombers were linked to a group of people arrested last month in the eastern town of Semarang and alleged to be members of the al-Qaida-linked Southeast Asian terror group Jemaah Islamiyah. Matori said the terror group was behind both the Marriott blast, which killed 10 people and injured 150, and the Oct. 12 Bali nightclub...