Free Republic

WANA, Pakistan (AP) - Pakistani troops killed a former Taliban fighter who led fierce resistance to the army's effort to flush out foreign militants from a rugged region near the Afghan border, the army spokesman said Friday. Nek Mohammed, who was allied with suspected al-Qaida militants, was killed in an overnight mortar assault on a mud-brick fortress in the South Waziristan region. Four others were also killed. "We were tracking him down and he was killed last night by our hand," Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan told The Associated Press in Islamabad, the Pakistani capital. Interior Minister Faisal Saleh Hayyat on...

Unidentified assailants have assassinated Shaykh Sha'lan Munif al-Faysal, better known as Sha'lan al-Jarbah, one of the tribal chieftains of Shammar, a big Iraqi tribe, in Iraq. News reports said that the incident took place in the city of Mosul when gunmen attacked the car in which Sha'lan al-Jarbah was travelling and exchanged fire with him. As a result, Al-Jarbah and his driver as well as one of the assailants were killed. Sources said there were conflicting reports on the motives for the assassination. Some people said that the assassination is a crime, whereas others said that the incident is probably...