About 40 people were wounded in the attack in Lakki Marwat, in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, on the main road and rail link between Punjab, Pakistan’s largest and most prosperous region, and the North and South Waziristan tribal regions.

A Pakistani army offensive drove militants out of South Waziristan in October. The militants still control much of North Waziristan, where US drone aircraft have been conducting a campaign of targeted killings.

Rescue workers and police officials were digging through rubble searching for survivors,a police official, Ghulam Mohammad Khan, said. Nine police officers, four adult civilians and four children on their way to school were killed in the attack.

Another police official, Liaquat Ali, said 45 police offciers were in the building when the bomber struck.

Local TV footage showed emergency workers using heavy machinery to move the rubble of the mostly destroyed police station. Books and a schoolbag could be seen in the wreckage alongside the twisted frames of a motorcycle and a car. A neighbourhood shop and mosque were also partly destroyed.

The police chief of Lakki Marwat was killed in a suicide bombing several months ago and militants have carried out a string of attacks in the area since then.

In recent days, militants have launched attacks aimed at destabilising the country and weakening a civilian government already struggling with a flooding crisis that has displaced millions and caused widespread destruction.

It is ironic (and tragic) that failing Pakistan is being destabilised and destroyed from the inside by the most pious and observant adherents of Islam. Their sympathisers and enablers exist at the highest levels of society and the government – recipients of billions in taxpayers’ money from the civilised world.

Billions from which there never seems to be a tangible return. Time to turn off the money pipeline to this most treacherous and dangerous country – and end the crazy levels of immigration from here to the west.

[Source: The Guardian]

Pakistanis waiting for aid - but Christians and those of other non-Muslim faiths are being denied help

Christians and members of other minority religions are being treated as second-class citizens, said Father Mario Rodrigues, the Lahore-based director of Catholic Mission.

“They often receive little assistance or are excluded altogether,” he told Fides, the Vatican’s news agency.

Aid is being delivered by “government officials sympathetic to Islamic fundamentalism or by Muslim relief organisations”, Fides claimed in its report, citing other unnamed aid workers.

About 200,000 Christians in Punjab province and about 600,000 Christians and Hindus in Sindh province have been affected by weeks of monsoon rain.

At least 1,600 people have been killed in the country’s worst natural disaster, and on Friday, officials warned that the death toll was expected to rise significantly as many people remained missing.

Over the past two days, fresh floods from the surging river Indus smashed through levees in two places, forcing one million people from their homes.

Ahmad Kamal, spokesman for the National Disaster Management Authority, denied the accusations of prejudice. “We have no discrimination, no requirements, no checklist. Aid goes to everyone,” he said [right. - Ed].

However, Nazir Bhatti, President of the Pakistan Christian Congress, urged donors to make special provisions for Christians.

“I appeal to organisations and countries which are giving aid to government of Pakistan for flood victims to allocate separate or special funds for Christian flood victims and transfer it to Caritas Pakistan or Bishops Conference of Pakistan for food, tents and medical facilities,” he said in a statement.

In all, some eight million people need emergency help and the monsoon season is due to last another three weeks.

The BBC has had the Pakistan floods story permanently affixed to he top of its news agenda for weeks now – but, true to form for an organisation that seems to delight in ‘informing’ us about Islam (and airbrushing out all the nasty bits), there is no mention whatsoever of this story – as always, it seems, it is left to a right-of-centre newspaper to present the fuller picture.

Future humanitarian aid should be witheld altogether, until the Pakistanis can prove that assistance is being given to all – and that an appropriate part of the massive amounts of ‘development aid’ it receives every year is apportioned to preventative work.

[Source: The Telegraph]

NEW DELHI – In yet another indication of the involvement of Pakistani establishment in the 26/11 Mumbai attack, Lashkare Toiba (LeT) operative David Headley has corroborated the statement of lone captured terrorist Ajmal Amir Kasab that the terrorists got training from Pakistan Navy.

During his interrogation, Kasab confessed that the 10 terrorists, including himself, who attacked Mumbai received training of swimming and underwater diving from the Pakistan Navy’s Frogmen.

“The role of frogmen was confirmed by Headley when the Indian investigators interrogated him in the US last month,” an official said.

This is being seen as another clear indicator of the Pakistani establishment’s involvement in the planning and execution of the Mumbai terror attack, which claimed 168 lives.

Home Secretary Gopal K. Pillai had recently said that Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) was “literally controlling and coordinating the (Mumbai) attack from beginning to end”.

Pakistani-American Headley, currently in American custody, was interrogated by a team of National Investigation Agency.

Officials said that the Indian investigators so far have no plan to interrogate Headley’s accomplice Tahawwur Hussain Rana, a Pakistani origin Canadian citizen, as his involvement in the Mumbai attack conspiracy was limited to providing finance.

“If necessary we may interrogate Rana also, though we have no immediate plan to do so,” an official said.

Headley has also told his interrogators that the Pakistani intelligence agency had paid Rs2.5 million to LeT to purchase a boat which terrorists used to travel from Karachi to the Pakistani maritime boundary, where they hijacked a fishing boat, ‘Kuber’, to reach Mumbai.

Headley also identified through voice sample test two ISI officers believed to be constant contact with the terrorists who carried out the 60-hour attack in Mumbai on November 26, 2008.

As this blog has been saying for some time, the evidence implicating the state of Pakistan in the horrific 26/11 Mumbai massacres has become impossible to ignore.

Ask your MP/Euro MP/Representative/Congressman.

[Source: Oman Tribune ]

They try to blow themselves up for Allah - you pay

Not content with their already sky-high parking charges, this is yet another bare-faced wallet-raid on Britain’s long-suffering airport users – apparently made necessary by the Muslim terrorists who made an attempt on Glasgow airport in 2007. Ahem.

A new £1 charge for dropping off or picking up passengers at Belfast International Airport is now in force.

The charge will only allow motorists to use the new drop-off zone for 10 minutes before they have to park.

The airport said the charge is due to the investment it made in the zone following guidelines issued after the Glasgow Airport bombing.

The Consumer Council said it can be avoided by using a free 10-minute period in the long-stay car park.

[Source: BBC News Online]

Radical Isamists are suspected of a campaign to deface posters considered 'sexy' in East London'

The Religion of sexual inadequacy and mysoginistic jealousy may be attempting to bring more of its seventh century bigotry to twenty-first century London:

Street adverts featuring women in bikinis have been defaced in apparently targeted attacks.

Most show women in swimwear by chain store H&M but another features a couple kissing to promote the Bollywood film Kites.

Residents in affected London areas suggested the images, which were daubed with black paint, could have been targeted by religious conservatives or radical feminists.

Police have not linked the campaign to any religious group but the damage is similar to attacks in Pakistan on billboard ads branded “un-Islamic” and “obscene” by hardliners.

Today women’s rights and anti-censorship activists joined Muslims and Christians to condemn the vandals.

Police said 14 bus shelters around Tower Hamlets, including many in Limehouse, were hit last month.

Residents told of similar damage in Waltham Forest. One said: “It seems to be a dedicated group who obviously have some serious issues with these adverts.”

After finding the black paint could be easily removed, the vandals switched to a sticky, tar-like substance which is harder to scrub off.

Agnes Callamard, of Article 19, a London-based organisation combating censorship, said: “While one may dislike some ads and find them offensive, this cannot be a basis for blacking out’ the picture.”

Avedon Carol, of Feminists Against Censorship, said: “The idea that somehow the image of women being sexy spreads all sorts of horribleness is reactionary and anti-women.”

The bus shelters are provided to Transport for London by advertising firm Clear Channel, which said the content was regulated by the Advertising Standards Authority.

A spokesman confirmed a rise in graffiti attacks and said each one cost £130 to put right. Dr Shaaz Mahboob, of British Muslims for Secular Democracy, said: “Many British Muslims wouldn’t go to the beach in a bikini but would never think it’s their right to impose their values on others like this.”

Pastor Henry Dixon, of Poplar Baptist Church, said: “If people feel that a poster is wrong then they should complain to the ASA. Causing criminal damage is not right.”

An H&M spokeswoman said: “A picture can be interpreted in many different ways. The interpretation is always in the eye of the beholder.

Now compare this to another story from the other side of the world:

Islamists in Peshawar have conducted similar campaigns to those seen in London recently

The depiction of uncovered women is considered un-Islamic by the Taliban, whose influence is growing in the North West Frontier province.

Similar edicts were issued and posters defaced in 2003. “These multinational companies want to promote obscenity, lewdness and vulgarity,” said a furious religious leader, Shehzada Babar.

Despite these protestations, images of women gradually began to reappear and had again become a fixture of Peshawar street life until this new wave of paint jobs. Last week, notices appeared warning people against un-Islamic activities, such as watching films and listening to music.

We need to be clear that no link has yet been proven between Islamists and these defacements. However, Tower Hamlets does have the highest proportion of Muslims in any area of the country (standing at well over 36% five years ago) and East London is also home to Britain’s most radical Islamists, including Anjem Choudary’s officially-disbanded but still active al-Muhajiroun jihadists.

Any British citizens among them should further consider whether pluralistic, democratic and gender-equal Britain really is the place for them.

[Sources: London Evening Standard, The Week]

Video from Indian NDTV above provides some background about David Headley, the American-Pakistani terrorist linked with the allegations in this story:

More proof, if any were needed, of Pakistan’s deadly double game with the West, as an insider reportedly confesses the long-suspected link between Pakistani spy agency ISI and the Lakshar -e-Taiba, the notorious terrorist group behind the 26/11 Mumbai Massacre in 2008:

NEW DELHI: Pakistani-American terrorist David Headley has confirmed that Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorists carried out the Mumbai attack under the “guidance” of Pakistan’s ISI.

Headley, who is being interrogated in the US by a team of NIA officials, has said that the notorious ISI was engaged with the Lashkar commanders responsible for the 26/11 carnage at “each and every stage of the plot”.

The account of the terrorist, who receed targets for Lashkar terrorists across the country, corroborates India’s stand about the involvement of Pakistani state actors in terrorism, trains the spotlight on LeT-ISI tandem, and explains Pakistan’s unwillingness to clamp down on the Lashkar leadership.

Headley has mentioned serving officers of Pakistan army — Major Sameer Ali, Major Iqbal and Major Haroon — as those who collaborated with the Lashkar terrorists. Major Sameer and Major Iqbal figured in the dossier India gave to Pakistani foreign secretary Salman Bashir.

NIA’s sessions with Headley tally with what he is learnt to have told the FBI, including the crucial bit about Hafiz Saeed being in the loop through the plot.

Whether the disclosures that undercut its denial will lead Pakistan to step up its cooperation with the 26/11 probe remains unclear.

Home minister P Chidambaram is to demand voice samples of seven Lashkar commanders including Zakiur Rahman Lakhvi, Zarar Shah, Abu Al Qama and others when he meets his Pakistani counterpart Rehman Malik during his visit to Islamabad for the conference of home ministers from SAARC region.

Pakistan has so far refused to give voice samples which could help investigators ascertain the identity of those who instructed the 26/11 attackers as they went about their deadly assignment.

It is common knowledge in military and intelligence circles tha Pakistan's duplicitous Inter Service Intelligence agency (ISI) is harbouring and assisting terror in the region and the wider world

Significantly, the ploy did not work because of resitance from Lashkar leaders, particularly Zakiur Rahman Lakhvi, one of the 26/11 masterminds. Lashkar leaders who have proclaimed themselves to be innocent and have accused India of levelling baseless charges, felt that the increased notoriety after 26/11 had raised the terror profile of the group and was going to help them with recruitment and funds.

Headley also admitted that while he had started off as a Lashkar recruit, he started drifting towards Al Qaida under the influence of Major Abdul Rahman Saeed. Saeed, who served with 6 Baloch Regiment of Pakistan army, took voluntary retirement in 2002 to devote himself full time to Al Qaida’s cause. Headley, who respected Saeed for his “sacrifice”, went high in the retired major’e esteem because of precise inputs he provided for the 26/11 attack.

Saeed, with the help of Ilyas Kashmiri, drafted him for the plan to attack Danish newspaper Jylland Posten which published controversial cartoons of Prophet Mohammad. This, when Headley’s original handler Sajid Mir wanted him to focus on Lashkar’s anti-India mission.

During his Pakistan visit, Chidambaram will also ask Islamabad to locate and arrest 13 absconders found guilty by Indian courts.

Ever since this blog’s inception we have been warning of Pakistan’s duplicitous gaming of the tolerance and generosity of the West.

Time to pull the funding, not the punches.

[Source: The times of India]

The Criminal Law Amendment Bill, drafted by women activists, was introduced in the house last year by then information minister Sherry Rehman, who won plaudits from both sides of the house. However, as you would expect, no such plaudits were forthcoming from male politicians and Islamists, who railed against it.

“Your wives are as a tilth unto you; so approach your tilth when or how ye will…” - Qur’an, 2:223

It’s All In The Book, of course. But Pakistani women have clearly had enough of sex-pest Pakistani men. Good for them:

Life for a woman in Karachi is becoming increasingly difficult as they are repeatedly accosted by men who think they are call girls.

Countless men stop their cars on the road whenever they see a lone woman standing at a bus stop or walking towards it. Lewd stares, catcalls and crude remarks have become a common phenomenon for women here.

“Once I was standing at Tariq Road when a man, who was wearing a shirt and tie and had an office identity card around his neck, stopped his car right in front of me. When I ignored him and walked towards a spot where a family was standing, he had the guts to turn back and stare at me for a good few minutes before he finally drove away!” quoted Sabina, a 20-year-old woman.

While some prefer to ignore such incidents, there are others would like to teach these men a lesson they won’t forget in a hurry.

A college girl recalled, “I was waiting for a bus in the afternoon once, when a car stopped and the driver continuously asked if I needed a ‘lift’. I moved away, he pulled up his car windows but still followed me. When my patience ran thin, I walked up to him, banged his windows and shouted at him ruthlessly. People gathered, the man was embarrassed and he sheepishly drove away.”

A woman’s attire whether conventional, orthodox or ‘modern’ makes no difference for these men.

Karachi-based sociologist Nabeel Zubairi observed, “This trend of bothering women on the roads is increasing, because their image has become drastically distorted at homes. Women used to have a stable status in the past, but now their perception in the eyes of men has become limited to that of a toy, thanks to our so-called transition towards industrialisation.”

Suggesting a solution, she said, “These mentally sick people can only be disciplined through proper legislation regarding abus issues. There is also a dire need for educating children at schools about their rights.”

Sexual harrassment is widespread throughout the Islamic world. The Qur’an, and ahadith (Islam’s scriptures), hold forth very definite ideas on the status of women and they are most certainly not of the ‘equitable and fair’ variety. This has engendered a culture from Islamabad to Bradford, from Riyadh to Kuala Lumpur, that women are fair game.

Good to see that these Karachi women who are standing up for themselves (and there have been admirable attempts to legislate against sxual harassment in Pakistan, but don’t expect to see material change any time soon.

[Source: The Siasat Daily]

Have they lost their memories, their minds – or both?:

NEW DELHI – Despite the relatively speedy verdict in India’s trial of the sole surviving gunman of the 2008 Mumbai attacks and talk of Ajmal Amir Kasab being “fast-tracked” to the gallows by the end of the year, Kasab could yet exploit the appeals process and delay his execution by years or even decades.

Judge Madan Laxmanlal Tahaliyani last week handed Kasab a death sentence after he was found guilty of waging war on India, mass murder, conspiracy and terrorism offences during the Mumbai attacks of November 26, 2008, during which 166 people were killed and 300 injured.

Kasab’s sentencing marked the culmination of a dramatic, high-profile trial that had consumed the public’s attention for 17 months, with a record 653 witnesses and a record 1,522-page judgment. The case, concluded in 271 days, was the fastest ever terror trial conducted in India. In contrast, the trial for the bombings of Mumbai in 1993 dragged on for 14 years.

However, legal experts say the trial’s swift conclusion could be undermined by a long delay in the sentencing process – India has not carried out an execution since 2004 and only two since 1998. According to Section 366 of the Criminal Procedure Code, the Mumbai trial court now needs to send the evidence for the Kasab case to the Bombay High Court, which needs to confirm the sentence. This could take up to a year or more.

If the High Court approves Kasab’s death sentence, the law gives him the option of appealing to the Supreme Court – there is no indication yet of whether he will appeal. The appeal would then be examined in great detail. If the Supreme Court approves the death sentence, Kasab – being a non-Indian – could still file a mercy petition before the president under Article 72 of the constitution.

While the presidential pardon is pending, Kasab’s execution would stay suspended – perhaps for decades. The president’s decision on a mercy petition involves many formalities, such as a need to consult the Council of Ministers.

If Kasab’s sentencing were to be stretched out, this could mar achievements seen in the judicial system’s handling of the trial. Observers say that despite the complexity and high drama of the trial, the court was still able to act swiftly and transparently. The legal fraternity is impressed that the rights of a man as clearly guilty as Kasab, who was caught on camera killing indiscriminately, were upheld by the system.

“The trial has depicted the Indian democratic processes in a favorable light. It has brought the massacre’s villain to book through the right legal procedures without any state pressure or political interference,” said Delhi-based advocate and activist Kamini Jaiswal. The lawyer said the trial underscored the “robustness of India’s criminal justice system”. All nine of the other gunmen who stormed into Mumbai with Kasab were killed during the attack.

A reminder of just some of Qasab's handiwork

Judge Tahilyani has been hailed as having conducted the trial with fairness, with his acquittal of Kasab’s Indian co-conspirators – Fahim Ansari and Sabahuddin Ahmad – for lack of evidence underscoring his refusal to crack under intense public pressure.

Despite the enormity of his crime, if Kasab does decide to appeal he could cite circumstances such as his young age, underprivileged background and lack of legal knowledge. The judge, on the other hand, is legally bound to give reasons for choosing capital punishment and not life imprisonment.

Once all due processes are cleared, Kasab’s death could be further delayed by a queue on India’s death row, where over 300 convicts await execution. However, Law Minister Veerappa Moily has said Kasab could be a special case. “This is one such case which needs to fast-tracked by the High Court. Sentiment is riding very high,” Moily told NDTV this week.

“If he doesn’t file any appeal anywhere I think the chances of him getting hanged this year are quite high,” Home Secretary G K Pillai told the CNN-IBN news channel in an interview.

Public anger at the prospect of Kasab evading execution came alongside heightened resentment of Pakistan’s failure to prosecute leaders of the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) group believed to have masterminded the attack. Some point to the recent case of the Pakistani-American who tried to bomb Times Square, Faisal Shahzad, as proof that Pakistan’s government and security forces are not serious enough about cracking down on militancy.

“It’s not just one incident here. This is part of a series, which is no longer an India-Pakistan problem,” Jasjit Singh, director of the Center for Strategic and International Studies in New Delhi, told the Associated Press.

India’s Home Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram is set to visit Pakistan on June 26 for a regional conference in Islamabad, where he will hold talks with Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik as part of a rapprochement process. Although Pakistan says it has begun a “secret” trial of some LeT members, India insists that full-fledged talks will not begin until terrorist groups are fully dismantled on Pakistani soil.

Apparently, there are 300-odd Death Row inmates ahead of Qasab and in the normal scheme of things it could take up to a year for him to be executed – and there is the further possibility of a string of appeals. But isn’t Qasab a little different to the others?

Let him swing – and to hell with the Islamists, UN, the Human Rights industry and the ‘international community’.

[Source: Asia Times]

US drones have been successful against terrorist groups in Pakistan - but would be even more so if the duplicitous Pakistani government would get off the fence

Yet another success for the US unmanned aircraft campaign, with the bonus that no good guys get killed:

 U.S. drone aircraft on Tuesday fired more than a dozen missiles into Pakistan’s North Waziristan, a major al Qaeda and Taliban sanctuary, killing at least 14 militants, Pakistani security officials said.

It was the third drone missile strike on militants in northwest Pakistan, bordering Afghanistan, since a failed bid to set off a car bomb in New York’s Times Square on May 1.

The United States is convinced that Pakistani Taliban militants allied with al Qaeda and operating out of northwestern border regions were behind the attempted bombing.

The drone attack was in Dattakhel village, about 30 km (20 miles) west of Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan.

“Three missiles hit a vehicle and three militants sitting in it were killed,” said an intelligence agency official in the region, who declined to be identified.

The drones then attacked a nearby militant compound, firing about 12 missiles into it.

“The militants have cordoned off the area so far they’ve retrieved 11 bodies from the debris,” said a second security official. “The death toll may rise because the militants are still searching for bodies.”

There was no word on the identity of any of the militants killed but the attack was in an area where members of an Afghan Taliban faction led by a commander known as Gul Bahadur operate. Foreign fighters linked to al Qaeda are known to be in the area.

Pakistani Taliban fighters fleeing an army offensive launched late last year on their South Waziristan bastion are also known to have taken refuge with their North Waziristan allies.

Pakistan publicly objects to attacks by CIA pilotless aircraft saying they are a violation of its sovereignty and fuel anti-U.S. feelings, which complicate Pakistan’s efforts against militancy.

Unofficially, however, analysts say Pakistan is cooperating with the United States in identifying at least some of the militant targets attacked by the drones.

On Sunday, at least six militants were killed in a similar strike in the same area.

Late last month, Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud, who was reported to have been killed in a drone strike in January, appeared in Internet videos threatening suicide strikes in the United States.

Last year, a drone killed Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud, who was accused of assassinating former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, in South Waziristan near the Afghan border.

The use of drones by the US in the Afghanistan/Pakistan theatre is one of the unsung success stories in this war against the Taliban/al-Qaeda nexus. They would do even better however, if the traitorous Pakistani Intelligence service (ISI) were not protecting the terrorists; moving the leaders between population centres within Pakistan that the US can’t reach.

The Pakistani government, who enables this chicanery, are playing a double game with the West – yet we still keep plying them with billions in aid and support every year – which seems to vaporise goodness only knows where.

Where is the quid pro quo? Perhaps it’s time to turn off the money pump and take the gloves off.

[Source: Reuters]

NEW YORK – Authorities arrested a suspect in the attempted weekend car bombing in Times Square, NBC News’ justice correspondent Pete Williams reported early Tuesday morning.
A U.S. citizen of Pakistani descent, Shahzad Faisal, was trying to leave the country Monday night at John F Kennedy International Airport when he was picked up by Customs and Border Protection agents, Williams reported.

Earlier, an official told The Associated Press that the potential suspect recently traveled to Pakistan. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because the case was at a sensitive stage.

This is somewhat ironic, given the seemingly frantic attempts by politicians and some elements in the media to avoid the ‘M’ word in this story. But we never doubted that they’d get there in the end.

There’s also another angle of this story that’s being played down – the location of the car bomb was close to the offices of megamedia corporation Viacom – owners of the Comedy Central network who screen the South park series, subject of much Islamoseething last week as a reference to Mohammed in one of its episodes was censored folowing threats from an American Islamist website.

Full story at MSNBC (via Jihadwatch). Read it all.