News/Pakistan/Afghanistan

ISLAMABAD: Nato yesterday invited Pakistan to key talks on the future of Afghanistan in Chicago next week as Islamabad signalled it was about to end a nearly six-month blockade on supply routes. Nato Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen telephone...

PESHAWAR: Pakistan’s north-western provincial government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provided 55 police guards to the ruling Awami National Party’s president, Asfandyar Wali Khan, and members of his family over threat to their life, the provincial asse...

KARACHI: Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani’s counsel in contempt of court case, Barrister Aitzaz Ahsan, yesterday said that the prime minister’s sentencing was against the law. Speaking to media representatives, Ahsan said the premier could not h...

PESHAWAR: Differences among local leaders over nomination of the coordination committee have blocked the Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) reorganisation in country’s north-western restive province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Some senior PML-Q leade...

ISLAMABAD: Custodial maltreatment is rampant in Pakistan, as a staggering 90pc of detainees are inflicted physical and mental torture at the hands of law enforcers, a report by various non-governmental organisations (NGO) has revealed. Human Develop...

ISLAMABAD: The Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) and the Capital Market Authority (CMA) of the Sultanate of Oman, while recognising increasing international activity in financial markets and the corresponding need for cooperation ...

ISLAMABAD: Pakistani leaders will meet next week to discuss ending a nearly six-month blockade on Nato supplies into Afghanistan, officials said yesterday. Tuesday’s meeting will also debate how and whether to repair relations with the United Stat...

KANDAHAR: Two consecutive roadside bombings in the southern Afghan province of Helmand killed eight people on Thursday, including seven members of one family, an official said. In the first incident a roadside bomb tore through a minivan travelling ...

British Prime Minister David Cameron (left) welcomes Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani to 10 Downing Street in London.

KABUL: An Afghan soldier opened fire on Nato troops in eastern Afghanistan yesterday, killing an American and leaving two others wounded, officials said. The death brings to 20 the number of Nato soldiers killed by Afghan colleagues in at least 15 s...

  PESHAWAR: Four young children were killed yesterday when a mortar slammed into their family’s vehicle as they attempted to escape a Pakistani military offensive, officials said. The children’s aunt and mother were wounded in the incident in ...

KABUL: After five years of rising deaths, civilian casualties in Afghanistan dropped 20pc in the first four months of the year, the United Nations said, a rare piece of good news as foreign combat forces prepare to pull out by the end of 2014. The k...

QUETTA: A bomb ripped through a Pakistani police patrol yesterday, killing one policeman and wounding three others in the increasingly troubled south-western city of Quetta, police said. The device was detonated remotely when a police vehicle on a r...

Kabul: Six Taliban suicide bombers died in an attempt to storm a government building in an eastern Afghan town yesterday that killed at least one policeman, police said. The policeman died as two of the attackers blew themselves up in front of the Y...

ISLAMABAD: Finance and energy managers are seeking to increase infrastructure development cess on natural gas and petroleum levy on oil products in the upcoming budget to generate funds for the Iran-Pakistan (IP) gas pipeline project and bridge the f...

LAHORE: The Government of Pakistan has issued new stamp papers with added security features to counter bogus printing and counterfeiting, it was learnt yesterday. The papers, which have Value of the new papers range from Rs20 to Rs25, 000, can only b...

KABUL: Afghanistan faces tougher security challenges in the next phase of a transition from foreign to Afghan forces as insurgents step up their attacks, Afghan officials said yesterday.     President Hamid Karzai is expected to announce on Sunda...

ISLAMABAD: The Red Cross yesterday suspended most of its aid projects in Pakistan and recalled foreign staff to the capital, following the brutal murder of a British worker. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said it had suspended a...

ISLAMABAD: Now that the judges of Pakistani Supreme Court have spoken, and in detail -the fate of Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani lies in the hands of one woman, Dr Fehmida Mirza, the Speaker of the National Assembly. Talking to reporters during a...

Pakistanis perform a traditional dance during a cultural heritage festival in Peshawar, yesterday. Culture and Information Minister Mian Iftikhar Hussain said that ‘Extremism is a phenomenon that needs to be tackled by undertaking strategies and ...

KABUL: Afghans will never accept US justice for five American soldiers involved in burning copies of the Quran, and could rise up in a “storm of fury” if there is no public trial, a senior cleric said on Saturday. The burning of Qurans at a Nato...

  An International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) soldier watches as Afghan men play cards during the opening ceremony of a clinic for war victims in Zharai district of Kandahar province yesterday.

    People walk along a decorated street during celebrations marking Eid-e-Milad-un-Nabi, the birthday of Prophet Mohammad (PBUH), in Lahore yesterday. Muslims in some countries celebrated the birth of the Prophet.

  Islamabad: Arfa Karim Randhawa (pictured), a Pakistani girl, who was the youngest Microsoft Certified Professional (MCP) in the world, died at Combined Military Hospital (CMH) of Lahore on Saturday night. Arfa, 16, became the world’s younges...

  School boys stand near fuel trucks which were set ablaze in the Bolan district of Pakistan’s Baluchistan province about two weeks ago. Gunmen on motorcycles opened fire on nine fuel trucks in the Bolan area of southwestern Baluchistan provinc...

KABUL: Afghanistan will accept a Taliban office in Qatar to help peace talks but no foreign power can get involved in the process without its consent, the government’s peace council said, as efforts gather pace to find a solution to the 10-year war...

ISLAMABAD: Pakistans economic managers, already beset with multiple challenges, have started to feel the political heat as the memogate saga puts civilian and military leadership on a collision course. They feel the reform process and economic reviv...

London: The Al Qaeda leadership, which has been weakened in Pakistan following the killing of many of its senior members -- including Osama bin Laden -- in drone strikes, is now suspected to be shifting to north Africa, a media report said yesterday....

WASHINGTON: US officials believe the country’s relationship with Pakistan has been seriously damaged and a counterterrorism alliance can survive only in a limited form, The New York Times reported Sunday. Citing unnamed US and Pakistani officials,...

  ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s prime minister Yousuf Raza Gilani yesterday denied domestic media reports he was planning to sack the powerful army and intelligence chiefs, saying the military supported democracy. The reports about army chief General As...