SRINAGAR, India — Government troops fired live ammunition and tear gas into crowds of anti-India protesters Monday, killing seven, police said as tens of thousands of people demonstrated across Indian-controlled Kashmir.

More than 60 protesters and almost 70 government forces were injured on one of the worst days in nearly two months of violent clashes between troops and residents who strongly oppose India’s rule over the predominantly Muslim region.

The top elected official in the predominantly Muslim region, Omar Abdullah, met with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in New Delhi on Monday to discuss defusing the crisis that has caused 40 deaths over seven weeks.

“The need is to end the cycle of violence. Some semblance of normalcy has to be a precursor for any political initiative,” Abdullah told reporters.

The recent unrest in the Himalayan region — divided between India and Pakistan and claimed by both — is reminiscent of the late 1980s, when protests against New Delhi’s rule sparked an armed conflict that has since claimed 68,000 lives, mostly civilians.

Kashmiri Muslims have held massive street protests, attacked security camps with rocks and burned police stations. Government forces have responded by using live ammunition and tear gas to break up the protests.

Clashes erupted again Monday in dozens of places across the region, as protesters defied a round-the-clock curfew.

At least two people were killed and another three wounded when government forces fired to disperse protesters blocking a highway in Sangam, a village south of Srinagar, said a police officer on condition of anonymity as he was not authorized to talk to reporters.

Government forces also fired on thousands of people holding street protests in the southern town of Kakpora, killing one and wounding five, the officer said.

As the news of the killing reached nearby villages, thousands more took to streets and burned a police station and scores of vehicles parked there, the officer said.

In the northern village of Kralpora, protesters set a security bunker on fire and ransacked a counterinsurgency police force camp, the officer said. Troops opened fire, killing one protester and wounding seven others, three critically, he said.

In another police shooting, one person was killed and another wounded in the southern village of Chawalgam, the officer said.

In the southern town of Kulgam, another protester was killed when government forces opened fire and used tear gas to control hundreds of marchers. At least 12 people were injured, four of them critically with bullet wounds, the police officer said.

One young boy was killed in a clash between the protesters and paramilitary forces in Srinagar, the officer said.

Local residents claimed that the boy was beaten to death by security forces. Police said they were investigating the cause of the death.

Another 20 people were injured in the southern town of Rajpora when police opened fire and used tear gas to quell the protesters who burned a police station, the officer said.

Protesters also burned a government building and a local intelligence office in Budgam, a town to the west of Srinagar, the region’s main city. Four protesters were injured there, the officer said.

The other injuries occurred in clashes elsewhere in the region, the officer said.

A state police statement said 39 police officers and 28 paramilitary soldiers also were injured in the daylong clashes with protesters.

In Srinagar, troops announced over public address systems mounted on their vehicles that stern action would be taken against those violating the curfew.

However, hundreds of protesters came out on the streets in several neighborhoods, chanting “Go India! Go back” and “We want freedom.” Troops fired warning shots and tear gas to disperse the protesters, the police officer said.

Abdullah, in New Delhi, described the situation in the Kashmir valley as worrisome and said that “some anti-social elements are hellbent to foment trouble, mayhem and bloodshed in the valley to satiate their political designs.”

On Sunday, he appealed to people of all shades of opinion, the media and religious heads to join the government in stopping the bloodshed, adding that he and his government cannot do it alone.

Last week, local authorities asked two retired judges to investigate the deaths of protesters, but the move has failed to calm the anger.

India and Pakistan have fought two wars over Kashmir since 1947.

Separatist politicians and militants reject Indian sovereignty over Kashmir and want to carve out a separate homeland or merge with predominantly Muslim Pakistan.

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Troops kill 7 protesters in Indian-ruled Kashmir

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — A pair of suicide bombings killed 62 people Friday outside a government office in a region along the Afghan border where the Pakistani army and U.S. missiles have had some success in decreasing the number of such attacks.

The assault, which wounded at least 111 people, was one of the deadliest in Pakistan this year. There was speculation that the bombers were targeting anti-Taliban tribal elders visiting the government office in the village of Yakaghund, part of the Mohmand tribal area in the country’s northwest.

The attackers struck within seconds of each other as two U.S. senators met with Pakistani leaders in the capital, Islamabad, to discuss their countries’ cooperation in the fight against terrorism, much of it being waged in the lawless tribal belt bordering Afghanistan where al-Qaida and the Taliban have long had redoubts.

One of the bombs appeared fairly small but the other was huge, officials said. At least one bomber was on a motorcycle.

The bombers detonated their explosives near the office of Rasool Khan, a deputy Mohmand administrator who escaped unharmed. The tribal elders, including those involved in setting up militias to fight the Taliban, were in the building, but none was hurt, according to Mohmand chief administrator Amjad Ali Khan.

Video footage showed dozens of men searching through piles of yellow brick and mud rubble for survivors. Women and children were among the victims.

Abdul Wadood, 19, was sitting in a vehicle at the time of the bombings.

“I only heard the deafening blast and lost consciousness,” said Wawood, who was being treated for head and arm wounds in Peshawar, the main city in the northwest, about 15 miles (25 kilometers) away. “I found myself on a hospital bed after opening my eyes. I think those who planned or carried out this attack are not humans.”

Some 70 to 80 shops were damaged or destroyed, while damage to a prison building allowed 28 prisoners — ordinary criminals, not militants — to flee, said Rasool Khan, who gave the casualty figures.

Near the attack site, officials had been distributing wheelchairs to disabled people and equipment to poor farmers, Amjad Ali Khan said. It was unclear how many participants in that event were among the victims.

Khan disputed reports that the aid was provided through U.S. funding, saying it came from Pakistani government funds.

However, U.S. Embassy spokesman Rick Snelsire confirmed that on the previous day Pakistani staff from a Washington-based contractor that receives USAID money had been giving out farm equipment in the village. The staff of that contractor, AED or Academy for Educational Development, were staying in the area, but were not believed to have been the targets Friday, Snelsire said.

Pakistani Taliban spokesmen could not be immediately reached after the attack. There were scattered reports that the militant group’s branch in Mohmand had claimed responsibility and said it was targeting the elders.

Mohmand is one of several areas in Pakistan’s lawless tribal belt where Taliban and al-Qaida members are believed to be hiding. The Pakistani army has carried out operations in Mohmand, but it has been unable to extirpate the militants. Its efforts to rely on citizen militias to take on the militants have had limited success there.

Nevertheless, there have been fewer attacks in Pakistan this year than in previous years — most notably in the northwest. In the last three months of 2009, more than 500 people were killed in a surge of attacks in the country.

Although information from the tribal belt is difficult to verify independently, the Pakistani army’s operations and U.S. missile strikes are believed to have calmed the situation since then.

The attacks that have occurred in 2010 have inflicted large numbers of casualties.

On New Year’s Day, a suicide car bomber struck a sports event near a meeting of tribesmen who supervise an anti-Taliban militia near the South Waziristan tribal area. At least 96 people were confirmed dead.

Some of the worst attacks in 2010 have taken place far from the northwest, in cities such as Karachi in the south and Lahore in eastern Punjab province.

Still, the main bases of militant groups in Pakistan are believed to be in the northwest, particularly the tribal regions, which have semiautonomous status and where the government has long had little influence.

Washington is watching closely how Pakistan handles its militant crisis, pushing the South Asian country to wage war on Taliban and al-Qaida fighters who use its territory to plan attacks against Western troops in Afghanistan.

U.S. Sens. Carl Levin, chairman of the Senate’s Armed Services Committee, and Jack Reed, a committee member, visited Pakistani officials in Islamabad on Friday. In a statement issued after his meeting with the American lawmakers, Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani said both countries should try harder to increase mutual trust.

He said Pakistan was doing its utmost to combat militancy, and “expected friendly countries like (the) U.S. to share with it credible and actionable information rather than indulging in blame game, in order to achieve our shared and common goal of succeeding against militancy.”

Over the past decade Pakistan and the U.S. have frequently questioned each other’s motives in the region.

Pakistan has been suspected of fomenting problems in Afghanistan as part of its regional struggle with India, while Islamabad has suggested that Washington gives favorable treatment to New Delhi in areas such as nuclear armament.

In a reference to its larger archrival, Gilani said the U.S. should take a “fair and nondiscriminatory approach … in its relations with the regional countries.”

In recent visits to Pakistan, U.S. officials have stressed that the relationship between the two countries has improved.

source: The Associated Press

ISLAMABAD: Renowned Atomic Scientist Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan Friday said Pakistan’s nuclear assets are completely secure and that ‘even a group of a thousand terrorists together won’t be able to gain access to its atomic technology.’

Talking to journalists here, Dr. Abudul Qadeer Khan rubbished the impression that Pakistan’s atomic programme is not safe.

“The atomic technology is not a rudimentary thing and it is impossible for anyone, including terrorists, to gain access to it,” Dr. Qadeer ruled out in an unequivocal tone.

He said no one can steal the nuclear technology because its assembling and use requires highest level of sophisticated expertise. “Even a thousand terrorists together can’t gain access to it,” he added.

Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan said cooperation in the field of nuclear science can be enhanced with trustworthy friends like China.

Pakistan has 4 million Ahmadis and is the only state to have officially declared the Ahmadis to be non-Muslims, their freedom of religion has been curtailed by a series of ordinances, acts and constitutional amendments. In 1974 Pakistan’s parliament adopted a law declaring Ahmadis to be non-Muslims. The country’s constitution was amended to define a Muslim “as a person who believes in the finality of the Prophet Muhammad”. In 1984 General Zia-ul-Haq, the then military ruler of Pakistan, issued Ordinance XX. The ordinance, which was supposed to prevent “anti-Islamic activities,” forbids Ahmadis to call themselves Muslim or to “pose as Muslims.” This means that they are not allowed to profess the Islamic creed publicly or call their places of worship mosques. Ahmadis in Pakistan are also barred by law from worshipping in non-Ahmadi mosques or public prayer rooms, performing the Muslim call to prayer, using the traditional Islamic greeting in public, publicly quoting from the Quran, preaching in public, seeking converts, or producing, publishing, and disseminating their religious materials. These acts are punishable by imprisonment of up to three years.
As a result of the cultural implications of the laws and constitutional amendments regarding Ahmadis in Pakistan, persecution and hate-related incidents are constantly reported from different parts of the country. Ahmadis have been the target of many attacks led by various religious groups. All religious seminaries and madrasahs in Pakistan, belonging to different sects of Islam, have prescribed essential reading materials specifically targeted at refuting Ahmadiyya beliefs.
In a recent survey in Pakistan, pupils in private schools of Pakistan expressed their opinions on religious tolerance in the country. The figures assembled in the study reflect that even in the educated classes of Pakistan, Ahmadis are considered to be the least deserving minority in terms of equal opportunities and civil rights. In the same study, the teachers in these elite schools showed an even lower amount of tolerance towards Ahmadis than their pupils.

Gunmen wearing suicide vests stormed two Pakistani mosques belonging to a minority sect in Lahore, bringing carnage to Friday prayers and killing around 80 people.

Squads of militants burst into prayer halls firing guns, throwing grenades and taking hostages in the deadliest attack on the city of eight million, which has been increasingly hit by Taliban and Al-Qaeda-linked violence.

Both mosques belonged to the Ahmadi community, which Pakistan has declared non-Muslim. Although the estimated minority of two million has been attacked by Sunni extremists before, the magnitude of Friday’s assault was unprecedented.

The United States condemned what it called “brutal violence against innocent people”.

“We also condemn the targeting and violence against any religious group, in this case the Ahmadi community,” State Department spokesman Philip Crowley told reporters in Washington.

Pakistan’s leading rights group said the community had received threats for more than a year and officials blamed the attack on Islamist militants, who have killed more than 3,370 people in bombings over the last three years.

“Terrorists have attacked mosques. They are firing and using grenades. They have taken people inside the mosque hostage,” district civil defence official Muzhar Ahmed told AFP from the scene in the bustling Garhi Shahu neighbourhood.

The attacks sparked more than two hours of gun battles with police and commandos, as bursts of heavy gunfire rocked the neighbourhoods and rescue services raced through the streets to tend to the victims.

“The prayer leader was delivering a sermon inside the hall when I suddenly heard distant gunshots,” Bilal Ahmed, a worshipper, told AFP after fleeing with his life from the mosque in Model Town.

“Then the firing became louder and closer and people started running here, there and everywhere to save themselves. Gunmen had entered the prayer hall and they were moving towards upper floors.

“The attackers were youths with beards who were not covering their faces. The floor was full of blood and broken glass,” Ahmed said.

As the gun battles ended in both locations, officials spoke of scenes of carnage — particularly in Garhi, Shahu where dozens of bodies were found.

“Around 80 people have been killed,” Sajjad Bhutta, the top city administrative official in Lahore, told reporters.

Doctor Rizwan Nasir, head of the rescue services in Lahore, said 108 people were wounded as police continued to search for any remaining attackers.

Taliban and Al-Qaeda-linked militants have orchestrated a three-year bombing campaign in Pakistan to avenge military operations and the government’s alliance with the United States over the war in neighbouring Afghanistan.

Friday’s attacks were the worst in Pakistan since a suicide bomber killed 101 people on January 1 at a volleyball game in Bannu, which abuts the tribal belt along the Afghan border that Washington calls an Al-Qaeda headquarters.

Nine attacks have killed around 265 people in Lahore since March 2009, a historical city, playground for the elite and home to many top brass in Pakistan’s powerful military and intelligence establishment.

The precise number of attackers at Garhi Shahu was not immediately clear, but police said there were at least three in Model Town.

“They came into the mosque from the back and started firing. They were armed with hand grenades and suicide vests and other weapons,” Rana Ayaz, a senior local police official, told AFP.

Officials said one of the attackers blew himself up and two were arrested — one of them a teenager. The other was seriously wounded.

Founded by Ghulam Ahmad, who was born in 1838, the Ahmadi sect has a number of unique views including that Ahmad himself was a prophet and that Jesus died aged 120 in Srinagar, capital of Indian-ruled Kashmir.

The 2009 US State Department report on human rights says that 11 Ahmadis were killed due to their faith during the year.

The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) said it had warned of threats against the Ahmadi community centre in Lahore and demanded “foolproof security and protection” from the government.

It expressed concern over “the increasing sectarian dimension” of militancy in Pakistan, which it called “a big security threat to the entire society”.

Religious violence in Pakistan, mostly between majority Sunni Muslims and minority Shiites, has killed more than 4,000 people in the past decades.

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80 dead as gunmen attack Pakistani mosques

Investigators in Pakistan and the US continue to pursue possible links between Faisal Shahzad, the New York bomb suspect, and fighters in Pakistan. The Pakistani Ambassador to Washington said that no such connection has yet been established. Pakistani’s and Pakistani Americans in Jackson Heights, New York, have been thrown on the defensive by recent events.

Pakistan on Tuesday made several arrests in connection with the failed Times Square car bomb attack in New York, security sources said.

World

“We have picked up a few family members” related to Faisal Shahzad, the chief suspect in the attempted attack, a security official in Karachi said. A friend of Shahzad was also arrested.

Shahzad, a 30-year-old Pakistani-American, was arrested late on Monday at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York after being removed from a plane as it was about take off for Dubai, American officials said.

Another intelligence official in Pakistan said Shahzad received militant training in northwest Pakistan near the garrison town of Kohat. The area around Kohat is a stronghold of Tariq Afridi, the main Pakistani Taliban commander in the region.

Pakistan, which could come under renewed U.S. pressure to crack down harder on militants after the Times Square incident, vowed on Tuesday to help the United States bring Shahzad to justice

Shahzad will appear in Manhattan federal court later on Tuesday to face charges “for allegedly driving a car bomb into Times Square on the evening of May 1,” according to a statement by U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara, FBI agent George Venizelos and New York City Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly.

“We will cooperate with the United States in identifying this individual and bringing him to justice,” Interior Minister Rehman Malik told Reuters.

U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan Anne W. Patterson met Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi and Malik and talked about the issue, Pakistani government officials and the U.S. Embassy said.

“We have an ongoing cooperation with the United States on anti-terrorism efforts. If required by the United States, we will extend full cooperation to them in this regard,” Pakistani Foreign Ministry spokesman Abdul Basit said.

‘HE BELONGS TO PABBI’

Malik said Faisal’s family came from northwestern Pakistan which is mainly inhabited by Pashtuns and where Islamic militants are active.

“He belongs to Pabbi,” he said, referring to a small town near the main northwestern city of Peshawar about an hour’s drive from Islamabad.

“He has Pakistani identification documents. We are making further checks.”

He added there had been no arrests in Pakistan so far.

A source familiar with the investigation in the United States said Faisal was of Kashmiri descent.

Pakistan is a key ally of the United States and has arrested hundreds of al Qaeda operatives and handed over many of them to the United States after it signed up to the U.S.-led war on terrorism after the September 11 attacks on the United States in 2001.

The Taliban in Pakistan said on Sunday it planted the bomb in Times Square to avenge the killing in April of al Qaeda’s two top leaders in Iraq as well as U.S. interference in Muslim countries.

Some officials voiced scepticism about the claim. But former CIA analyst Bruce Riedel, who last year oversaw an Obama administration strategy review on Afghanistan and Pakistan, cautioned against dismissing a possible role by the Taliban.

Source:Reuters

PESHAWAR, Pakistan, April 19 (Xinhua) — At least 18 people were killed as a second blast hit a crowded market in the Pakistani northwestern city of Peshawar on Monday, said local sources.

One police officer was also killed in the attack, hospital sources told Xinhua.

The blast was targeted on a protest rally against the electricity loadshedding in downtown Peshawar. It was followed by firing, eyewitnesses said.

Related:

Blast rocks school in Pakistan’ s Peshawar, 1 child killed

Seven people have been killed and more than 20 wounded in a car bomb attack in north-western Pakistan.
A senior police official in the city of Kohat said a suicide bomber had driven a vehicle into the rear wall of a police station.
He suggested the incident was a response to a military operation that is under way in the area.
On Saturday two suicide bombers killed more than 40 people and wounded at least 60 at a displaced people’s camp.
That attack occurred about 40km (25 miles) away from the site of Sunday’s attack.
On Friday a suicide attack at a hospital in the south-west Pakistani city of Quetta killed at least 10 people and injured 35 more.
The attacker detonated a bomb in a waiting room at the Civil Hospital where people had gathered following the fatal shooting of a Shia businessman.
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Car bomb in north-west Pakistan city of Kohat