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☆ Pakistan Suicide Bombing Death Toll Rises to at Least 100
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-01 | by ( Saeed Shah | Waqar Gillani | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan—The death toll in a suicide bombing in northwestern Pakistan climbed to at least 100 on Tuesday as rescuers pulled bodies out of the rubble of a mosque hit by one of the country’s deadliest terrorist attacks. Emergency crews worked through the night to pull the dead and injured from the debris of the mosque in a large police compound in the city of Peshawar. The compound included police offices and housing.

☆ Pakistan Suicide Bombing Death Toll Rises to At Least 95
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-31 | by ( Saeed Shah | Waqar Gillani | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan—The death toll in a suicide bombing in northwestern Pakistan climbed to at least 95 on Tuesday as rescuers pulled bodies out of the rubble of a mosque hit by one of the country’s deadliest terrorist attacks. Emergency crews worked through the night to pull the dead and injured from the debris of the mosque in a large police compound in the city of Peshawar. The compound included police offices and housing, and many of those killed were police. More than 220 people were injured, officials said Tuesday.

☆ Pakistan mosque bombing death toll rises to 87
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-31 | by ( Jibran Ahmad | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

[1/5] Chief of Army Staff (COAS) of Pakistan Asim Munir and Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif visit an injured, after a suicide blast in a mosque, at a hospital in Peshawar, Pakistan January 30, 2023. Prime Minister's Office/Handout via REUTERSPESHAWAR, Pakistan, Jan 31 (Reuters) - The death toll in the suicide bombing that tore through a mosque in Pakistan rose to 87 on Tuesday, a hospital official said, a day after the one of the biggest attacks in the unstable South Asian nation. The attack occurred in one of the most fortified areas of the northwestern Peshawar city, which houses offices of the police and counter-terrorism departments. Hospital official Mohammad Asim said that 87 people had been killed, and that 57 people were being treated, seven of whom were in critical condition. Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), an umbrella of Sunni and sectarian Islamist groups, has denied responsibility.

[1/2] People wait for their turn to get fuel at a petrol station in Peshawar, Pakistan January 30, 2023. If we don't have LCs (letters of credit) open right now, we might see shortages in the next fortnight," a senior official at one of the oil companies told Reuters. Oil traders, however, are shunning countries such as Pakistan and Sri Lanka due to an acute shortfall of foreign exchange. State-owned refiner Pakistan State Oil (PSO) and Pakistan LNG Ltd have left a flurry of fuel tenders unawarded in the last couple of months. Pakistan bought only 223,000 tonnes of gasoline in December versus 608,000 tonnes in the same period a year earlier, data from Kpler showed.

☆ Pakistan Bombing at Mosque Kills at Least 59
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-30 | by ( Saeed Shah | Waqar Gillani | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan—At least 59 people were killed by a suspected suicide bombing at a mosque within a police compound in northwestern Pakistan, authorities said. The blast took place at a mosque located in a high security zone in the city of Peshawar on Monday, in a crowd of worshippers gathered for lunchtime prayers, causing part of the structure to collapse. Authorities said most of those killed were police and estimated that more than 160 people were injured.

☆ Pakistan Bombing at Mosque Kills at Least 44
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-30 | by ( Saeed Shah | Waqar Gillani | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan—At least 44 people were killed by a suspected suicide bombing at a mosque within a police compound in northwestern Pakistan, authorities said. The blast took place at a mosque located at the compound in the city of Peshawar on Monday, causing part of the structure to collapse. Authorities said most of those killed were police and estimated that more than 160 people were injured.

☆ Suicide bomber kills 59 at Pakistan mosque used by police officers
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-30 | by ( The Associated Press | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +1 min

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — A suicide bomber struck a crowded mosque inside a police compound in Pakistan on Monday, causing the roof to collapse and killing at least 59 people and wounding more than 150 others, officials said. He expressed his condolences to families of the victims, saying their pain “cannot be described in words.”Police said between 300 to 350 worshippers were inside the mosque when the bomber detonated his explosives. Sarbakaf Mohmand, a commander for the Pakistani Taliban, also known as Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan or TTP, claimed responsibility for the attack on Twitter. Pakistan, which is mostly Sunni Muslim, has seen a surge in militant attacks since November, when the Pakistani Taliban ended their cease-fire with government forces. Monday’s assault on a Sunni mosque was one of the deadliest attacks on security forces in recent years.

☆ Pakistan Bombing at Police Compound Kills at Least 28
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-30 | by ( Saeed Shah | Waqar Gillani | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan—At least 28 people were killed by a blast at a police compound in northwestern Pakistan that authorities said they suspected was a suicide bombing. The blast took place at a mosque located at the compound in the city of Peshawar on Monday, causing part of the structure to collapse. Authorities said most of those killed were police and estimated that about 150 people were injured.

☆ Blast kills at least 19 worshippers at mosque in Pakistan's Peshawar
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-30 | by ( Jibran Ahmad | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

PESHAWAR, Pakistan, Jan 30 (Reuters) - An explosion in a mosque killed at 19 worshippers and wounded dozens more in Pakistan's northwestern city of Peshawar on Monday, a hospital official said, and many of the casualties were police officers who had gathered for daily prayers. The mosque was located close to a police housing block, and there were some 260 people inside when the blast occurred, according to police. A two-storey building has collapsed," an eyewitness told local news channel Geo TV, saying he was just outside the mosque when explosion happened. "We received 19 dead and over 90 injured from the Peshawar Police Lines blast," said Mohammad Asim, a spokesman for the city's Lady Reading Hospital, referring to the neighborhood. "A portion of the building had collapsed and several people are believed to be under it," police official Sikandar Khan said.

☆ Suicide bomber kills 28, wounds 150 at mosque in NW Pakistan
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-30 | by ( ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

Security personnel cordon off the site of a mosque blast inside the police headquarters in Peshawar on January 30, 2023. Police between 300 to 350 worshipers were inside the mosque when the bomber detonated his explosives. A survivor, 38-year-old police officer Meena Gul, said he was inside the mosque when the bomb went off. Former Prime Minister Imran Khan also condemned the bombing, calling it a "terrorist suicide attack" in a Twitter posting. Pakistan has witnessed a surge in militant attacks since November when the Pakistani Taliban ended their cease-fire with government forces.

☆ At least 10 children killed in Pakistan as boat capsizes
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-29 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

PESHAWAR, Jan 29 (Reuters) - At least 10 children were killed on Sunday when a boat carrying religious school students capsized in northwest Pakistan, officials said. Around eight students were still missing while seven injured had been taken to hospital, according to local officials in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province where the accident took place. Kohat's district commissioner Mahmood Aslam said around 50 students from a local religious school, had gathered near Tanda lake for a picnic. Twenty-five had ventured out on the water - which was closed by authorities for recreational trips - on a boat that capsized, he said. The accident came the same day as a bus accident in southern Pakistan that killed more than 40 people.

ISLAMABAD, Jan 24 (Reuters) - Pakistan's energy ministry said on Tuesday it had restored its national power grid nearly 24 hours after a breakdown triggered the worst outage in months, highlighting the frailty of the aid-dependant nation's infrastructure. All 1,112 grid stations were back online, a senior government official told Reuters, adding that electricity would be fully restored across the country once power generation units were back up. The outage, which began on Monday morning during the peak winter season, is the second major grid failure to hit the nation of 220 million people since October, though there are partial blackouts almost daily. Residents in major cities said they now had electricity, but some areas of the country were still without power. China has invested in its power sector as part of a $60 billion infrastructure scheme that feeds into Beijing's "Belt and Road" initiative.

☆ Tens of millions without power after Pakistan suffers major outage
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-23 | by ( Associated Press | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +3 min

Much of Pakistan was left without power for several hours on Monday morning as an energy-saving measure by the government backfired. The outage was reminiscent of a massive blackout in January 2021, attributed at the time to a technical fault in the country’s power generation and distribution system. According to the minister, during winter, electricity usage typically goes down overnight. A Metro station is closed after major power outage in Lahore, Pakistan on Monday. Pakistan is grappling with one of the country’s worst economic crisis in recent years amid dwindling foreign exchange reserves.

☆ Pakistan suffers major power outage after grid failure
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-23 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

ISLAMABAD, Jan 23 (Reuters) - Pakistan suffered country-wide power cuts early on Monday due to a major breakdown in its national grid, the federal energy ministry said. "According to initial information, at about 7:34 AM (local time) today, the National Grid experienced a loss of frequency, that caused a major breakdown. Power was out in all major cities, including Karachi, Islamabad, Lahore and Peshawar. This is not a major crisis," Dastagir said. Reporting by Asif Shahazad, writing by Shilpa Jamkhandikar; editing by Sudipto GangulyOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Islamabad, Pakistan CNN —A nationwide power outage in Pakistan left nearly 220 million people without electricity on Monday, threatening to cause havoc in the South Asian nation already grappling with fuel shortages in the winter months. It is unclear how long the outage will last and efforts are underway to restore power to various parts of the country. The outage comes as the country’s fragile economy continues to struggle with multiple challenges, including a severe energy crisis. The decision to reduce energy usage came as Pakistan announced its foreign exchange reserves had dwindled to alarmingly low levels. Monday’s power outage is Pakistan’s most widespread power shutdown since 2021, when the nation plunged into darkness for hours after a “sudden plunge in the frequency in the power transmission system.”

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Afghanistan’s Taliban-run government on Saturday ordered all local and foreign nongovernmental organizations to prevent female employees from reporting to work, in the latest restrictive move against women’s rights and freedoms in the country. The order was made in a letter written in Persian by Economy Minister Qari Din Mohammed Hanif, Abdur Rahman Habib, a spokesman for Afghanistan’s Economic Ministry, told NBC News. Afghan women protest against a new Taliban ban on women accessing university education on Thursday in Kabul, Afghanistan. Getty ImagesForeign governments, including Muslim-majority Saudi Arabia and Turkey, condemned the university ban, which also led to criticism and protests inside Afghanistan. In the western city of Herat on Saturday, Taliban forces used water cannons to disperse women protesting the ban on university education, Reuters reported.

One hostage, a security official, died during the raid , he said. The army spokesman's comments provided the first detailed official account of the standoff, in which two security personnel were killed when the militants first took over the compound, and two commandoes killed in the ensuing raid. Later other militants at the centre broke into a storeroom where confiscated weapons had been stored. STANDOFFAfter talks failed to resolve a two-day standoff, army commandos stormed the centre on Tuesday. Earlier, residents said they heard explosions coming from the vicinity of the centre on Tuesday as helicopters hovered overhead.

Pakistani Taliban militants detained at the centre had snatched interrogators' weapons and taken them captive on Sunday. Asif did not say how many militants were killed or how many hostages they had held. Residents said they heard explosions coming from the vicinity of the centre on Tuesday as helicopters hovered overhead. The army operations forced the militants and their leaders to flee to neighbouring Afghan districts. There, Islamabad says, they set up training centres to plan and launch attacks inside Pakistan, a charge Afghan authorities deny.

According to a provincial government spokesman, the militants were demanding safe passage to Afghanistan. "We are in negotiations with the central leaders of the Pakistani Taliban in Afghanistan," Mohammad Ali Saif, a spokesman for Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provincial government, said. He said the authorities were yet to receive a response from the Pakistani Taliban, adding that relatives of the militants and area tribal elders had also been involved in initiating talks with the Islamists inside the facility. The militants in control of the interrogation facility had demanded a safe passage to Afghanistan, a TTP statement sent to a Reuters reporter said. It added the TTP had also conveyed the demand to Pakistani authorities, but hadn't heard back any "positive" response.

DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan, Dec 18 (Reuters) - Islamist militants seized a counter-terrorism centre in the northwestern Pakistani area of Bannu on Sunday and took hostages to negotiate with government authorities, officials said. One said about 15 militants took control of the centre after overpowering interrogators inside, grabbing their weapons and taking five or six of them hostage. Pakistan has been fighting an insurgency by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan. A spokesman for the TTP did not immediately confirm or deny a link with the militants in the compound. Reporting Saud Mehsud in Dera Ismail Khan and Jibran Ahmad in Peshawar; Writing by Gibran PeshimamOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ Kabul hotel attack ends as three gunmen killed; two foreigners injured
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-12 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

KABUL, Dec 12 (Reuters) - Armed men opened fire on Monday inside a hotel in central Kabul popular with Chinese nationals in an attack that ended when at least three gunmen were killed by security forces, the Taliban-run administration said. Two foreigners were injured while trying to escape by jumping from the hotel balcony, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid wrote on Twitter. Kabul's Emergency Hospital, run by an Italian non-profit near the attacked hotel in the Shahr-e-Naw area, reported receiving 21 casualties - 18 injured and three dead on arrival. Taliban sources said the attack was carried out at Longan Hotel where Chinese and other foreigners usually stay. China's state-run Xinhua news agency said the attack happened near a Chinese guesthouse and its embassy in Kabul was closely monitoring the situation.

☆ Ambush claimed by Pakistani Taliban kills three police officers in northern Pakistan
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-03 | by ( Jibran Ahmad | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

PESHAWAR, Dec 3 (Reuters) - The Pakistani Taliban on Saturday claimed responsibility for a gun ambush that killed three police officers in northern Pakistan, the second attack claimed by the group just days after it announced an end to a ceasefire with the government. He said three police officers were killed on the spot and the identity of the attackers was unknown. The militant group Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) claimed responsibility for the attack in a statement. The Afghan Taliban have been facilitating peace talks between local militants and the government since late last year. The Pakistan army has conducted several operations against the militants in their strongholds in lawless districts along Afghan border in recent months.

☆ Taliban militants in Pakistan end ceasefire with government - spokesman
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-28 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

PESHAWAR, Pakistan, Nov 28 (Reuters) - Taliban militants in Pakistan will no longer abide by a months-long ceasefire with the Pakistani government, a spokesman for the militant group said on Monday. The Afghan Taliban have been facilitating peace talks between local militants and the government since late last year. The end of the ceasefire comes ahead of a visit by a Pakistani delegation, led by state minister for foreign affairs Hina Rabbani Khar, to Kabul on Tuesday. Mohammad Khurasani, a spokesman for the militant group Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) told Reuters in a text message that its leadership had decided to end the ceasefire with Pakistan. The Pakistani military has carried out several offensives against the militants in their strongholds in remote lawless districts bordering Afghanistan.

☆ Pakistan reopens Afghan crossing shut after border hostilities
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-21 | by ( Gul Yousafzai | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

REUTERS/Saeed Ali Achakzai/File PhotoQUETTA, Pakistan, Nov 21 (Reuters) - Pakistan has reopened a major Afghan border crossing that was shut for trade and transit after security forces clashed last week, officials from both sides said on Monday. As the crossing opened on Monday, three people were wounded in another clash reported on a northwestern border with Afghanistan, an Afghan official said. A Pakistani security official said the fresh exchange of fire killed one member of border personnel and wounded nine other people. "We are going to meet senior Pakistani officials to find an amicable solution," he said. The Pakistan military did not respond to a request for comment, but a Pakistan security official said there has been regular border management coordination with Afghan authorities, adding that details of Afghan investigations into last week's hostilities will be shared with Pakistan in due course.

☆ Supporters of Pakistan's Imran Khan block roads in new protest
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-08 | by ( Asif Shahzad | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

[1/5] People react as police use tear gas to disperse them during a protest to condemn the shooting incident on a long march held by Pakistan's former Prime Minister Imran Khan in Wazirabad, in Rawalpindi, Pakistan November 4, 2022. The former cricket star, who has been pressing for a general election since he was ousted as prime minister after losing a confidence vote in parliament in April, was shot at the rally last Thursday. Khan's successor as prime minister, Shehbaz Sharif, has rejected his demand for new polls and the deadlock has stoked instability in the nuclear-armed country of 220 million people. Television footage showed Khan's supporters burning tyres as they set up protest camps across roads. Khan, 70, launched what is known as a long-march protest rally from Lahore to the capital on Oct. 28.

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