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SNIPPET: "PESHAWAR, Pakistan -- Islamist militants blew up a girls school in Pakistan's lawless Khyber tribal district Sunday, destroying the building and wounding four people in neighbouring homes, officials said. Two explosions ripped through the 18-room government high school for girls at Kari Gar village and a boy who watched the premises is missing..." SNIPPET: "Islamist militants, who have carved out a strong presence in Pakistan's semi-autonomous tribal belt on the Afghan border, have destroyed hundreds of schools, mostly for girls, in the northwest of the country in recent years. Nearly 200 schools were destroyed in the Swat valley alone...

PESHAWAR: A top Taliban commander who was injured in a military operation in which he was arrested last week, died from his injuries on Sunday, the Pakistani military said. 'Sher Mohammad Qasab, who had multiple bullet wounds succumbed to his injuries on Sunday morning,' it said in a statement. The army had Wednesday arrested Sher Mohammad Qasab, who is one of the most senior Taliban commanders on a most wanted list in the Swat valley that offered Rs10 million in reward money. 'A team of army doctors was treating Sher Mohammad Qasab but he could not survive,' the statement said....

Taliban announces surrender in Swat Valley after leader Maulana Fazlullah 'arrested' The Taliban has announced its surrender in Swat Valley, one of its major strongholds until a Pakistan Army offensive regained control earlier this summer. By Emal Khan in Peshawar and Dean Nelson in New Delhi Published: 11:00PM BST 12 Sep 2009 Its announcement, made on one of its pirate radio stations, came as its charismatic leader Maulana Fazlullah was reported to be surrounded by Pakistani troops, and there were claims that he had in fact already been arrested. Their collapse in Swat, if confirmed, will deal a serious blow...

Most wanted Taliban leader in ‘death throes’ The leader of Taliban militants in Swat Valley has been critically wounded and is close to death, a report quoting the BBC said yesterday. The information about Maulana Fazlullah confirms statements from senior government and security officials. A former village cleric, Fazlullah founded the branch of the Taliban movement which eventually took over the Swat Valley. After a recent offensive, the Army said it had almost defeated rebels in that sector of the northwest. The government said it had regained control of the region. The information about Maulana Falzullah was gathered from interviews...

The leader of Taliban militants in Pakistan's Swat district has been critically wounded and is close to death, the BBC has learned. The information about Maulana Fazlullah confirms statements from senior government and security officials. A former village cleric, he founded the branch of the Taliban movement which eventually took over the Swat valley. After a recent offensive, Pakistan's army says it has almost defeated rebels in that sector of the north-west. It has been battling Taliban militants there for about two months and the government says it has regained control of the region. 'No medicine' The information about Maulana...

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The claim made by Mr Malik, the head of the interior ministry, could not be confirmed and exceeded that given by the military on Sunday by at least 200. Mr Malik's announcement came as fighting continued in the Swat Valley and the northeast of Pakistan faced a worsening refugee crisis. Pakistan Paramilitary troops secure a checkpoint leading to Swat Valley "The operation will continue until the last Talib," said Mr Malik. "We haven't given them a chance. They are on the run. They were not expecting such an offensive." The army's senior spokesman said on Sunday that so far some...

* Taliban plant roadside bombs in populated streets, destroy two schools, kill prayer leader * Troops secure Shangla top, key townsThe security forces said on Sunday they had killed up to 200 Taliban in 24 hours during the on-going operation in Swat as they secured the Shangla top and important towns and ridges in Dir and Buner. Troops engaged the Taliban in their Peochar headquarters and at hideouts in Kanju, Mingora, Banai Baba, Namal, Qambar, Fizagath, Tiligram and Chamtalai, the Inter-Services Public Relations directorate said in an update. Taliban’s indiscriminate mortar fire and roadside bombs planted in populated areas killed...

The seeds of Pakistan’s rapid descent began in mid February with a peace agreement crafted by cleric Sufi Mohammed that the Taliban would disarm in exchange for control of the Swat Valley. In India there was shock and horror that Pakistan’s government could accept such a deal. The Times of India reported at the time: "Reactions from US officials to Islamabad’s latest "peace deal" with extremist forces who have scorched the Swat region indicated that Washington was once again buying into the discredited theory of 'good Taliban and bad Taliban.'"

The Swat offensive intensified on Thursday with the army bringing in gunship helicopters and jet fighters to target militant hideouts in the district's Khwazakhela tehsil. Meanwhile, the corps commanders were holding a meeting in the GHQ to review the operations against the Taliban. Taliban have besieged the Matta police station, and police and militants continue to exchange fire, DawnNews reported. Tens of thousands of Swat's residents have started streaming out of the valley after authorities relaxed the curfew till 06:00 p.m. The curfew in Khawazakhela however remains in tact. Swat's top administrator, Khushal Khan, said people were not being advised...

Shop owner Saeed Khan has already buried one child killed in fighting between the Taliban and government forces in northwest Pakistan. He cannot bear to lose another, AFP reports. So the 50-year-old bundled his wife, son and daughter onto a bus in the Taliban-infested town of Mingora in the Swat valley and hurried to the city of Peshawar, hoping for a future free from further bloodshed. ‘I lost my son, who was a police officer in Swat, in a suicide attack in Mingora early this year. I buried him in front of my house,’ Khan told AFP, tears rolling down...

Residents of Pakistan's Swat Valley are reported to be fleeing their homes despite authorities rescinding an earlier order for them to leave. A peace deal between the government and Taleban militants in the region appears close to collapse after the army said militants attacked police checkpoints. There has also been heavy fighting to the west and east of Swat. A major army operation against the Taleban appears likely within a few days, says the BBC's Syed Shoaib Hasan. Our Islamabad correspondent says the army seems in an uncompromising mood, with the renewed violence apparently the death knell for the peace...

The high-profile arrest of a group of Pakistani militants in mid-April in the restive Afghan province of Helmand by the Afghan army and their subsequent handover to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) for grilling exposed a jihadi network running to the heart of urban Pakistan. In the course of interrogation, the militants confessed to being recruited, trained and then launched into Helmand after spending some time in places such as the southern port city of Karachi and Quetta, the capital of Balochistan province. They also gave details of their Pakistani leaders and their activities, including how these leaders could...

The Pakistani Taliban, even while continuing their penetration of central Pakistan, have begun mobilizing fresh recruits from all over the country to go help their Afghan Taliban brothers resist the newly arriving Western troops. The Taliban now control the tribal regions of Pakistan, huge sections of the Swat Valley and have just consolidated their control over the district of Buner, just 60 miles from Islamabad...(Snip) Pakistan was one of only two nations on earth that recognized the Taliban as Afghanistan's legitimate government (the other being Osama's home country of Saudi Arabia)...(Snip) Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made headlines last weekend...

TALIBAN militants who have seized swathes of North West Frontier Province in Pakistan have inflicted a reign of terror on villagers, landowners and the police, using kidnapping, looting, pillaging and murder to impose their will. Yesterday, as Pakistani forces stepped up their campaign to retake territory in the districts of Buner, Dir and Swat, it emerged that in one Taliban-controlled village, Pir Baba in Buner, the militants were holding 2,000 people as human shields in case the army attacked. Elsewhere the Taliban appeared to be relying on kidnapping to extort funds and intimidate the population. Many of their victims have...

Irfan Masih, the 11-year-old boy wounded on 22 April during a Taliban attack against Christians in Tiasar Town near Karachi, has died. In critical conditions from the start, the boy slipped away after five, agonisingly long days. Fr Emmanuel Yousaf Mani, the director of the National Commission for Justice and Peace (NCJP), led a delegation to the site of the attack. The group, made up of clergymen and lay people, visited the wounded in hospital and then met leaders of the Muttahida Quami Movement(MQM), the only Pakistani party that is opposed to the introduction of Sharia in the Swat Valley....

Via Yahoo News:MINGORA, Pakistan – Pakistan was trying to end bloodshed when it let the idyllic Swat Valley fall under Islamic law last week. Instead, it has emboldened the Taliban to extend a hand to militants, including Osama bin Laden. The local spokesman for the Taliban, which control the valley, told The Associated Press he'd welcome militants bent on battling U.S. troops and their Arab allies if they want to settle there. "Osama can come here. Sure, like a brother they can stay anywhere they want," Muslim Khan said in a two-hour interview Friday, his first with a foreign journalist...

A potentially troubling era dawned Sunday in Pakistan's Swat Valley, where a top Islamist militant leader, emboldened by a peace agreement with the federal government, laid out an ambitious plan to bring a "complete Islamic system" to the surrounding northwest region and the entire country. Speaking to thousands of followers in an address aired live from Swat on national news channels, cleric Sufi Mohammed bluntly defied the constitution and federal judiciary, saying he would not allow any appeals to state courts under the Islamic Sharia law system that will now prevail there as a result of the peace accord signed...

Having forcibly taken over Buner district adjoining Swat Valley, Taliban militants have begun using mosques in the area as "recruitment centres" to attract youths to join their ranks. 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 entry of Taliban into Buner, which is just about 100 km from the federal capital, has raised alarm throughout Pakistan as to the intentions of the...

Pakistan: Anonymous "miscreants" blow up girls' school Once again, the unknown miscreants vent their rage on girls' schools. Of course, had this report explained the stated goals of these "miscreants" -- the total application of sharia, including keeping females uneducated -- this story would make a bit more sense. "Miscreants blow up girls' school at Bannu," from Geo TV, April 5: BANNU: Some unidentified miscreants have blasted with explosives a girls' school in the town here. Sources said that the miscreants this morning blasted with a bang a girls’ school located in the vicinity of Miryan police station here by...