Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Baluch Nationalist Tribal Leader Buried

Demonstrators in Quetta protest Bugti's killing on August 28 (epa)

September 1, 2006 -- Pakistani authorities today hastily buried an ethnic Baluch tribal leader who was killed by Pakistan's military on August 26.

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September 01, 2006

Relatives of the Baluch nationalist leader Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti complain that the government did not allow them to claim his body or arrange his funeral.

They say only about 30 relatives attended the burial, at the family's ancestral graveyard in Dera Bugti.

A strike, called by opposition parties after Bugti's killing, shut down large areas of Baluchistan Province today and also affected parts of Sindh and Punjab provinces.

Mobs set fire to a police post and shops in Baluchistan's Panjgur district. Police say they have arrested some 70 people for inciting trouble.

(AFP)

Afghanistan And Pakistan

Afghan President Hamid Karzai (left) with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf in Islamabad in October 2005 (epa)

ACROSS A DIFFICULT BORDER. The contested border between Pakistan and Afghanistan is some 2,500 kilometers long and runs through some of the most rugged, inhospitable territory on Earth. Controlling that border and preventing Taliban militants from using Pakistan as a staging ground for attacks in Afghanistan is an essential part of the U.S.-led international coalition's strategy for stabilizing Afghanistan. Officials in Kabul have been pointing their fingers at Pakistan for some time, accusing Islamabad or intelligence services of turning a blind eye to cross-border terrorism targeting the Afghan central government. Many observers remain convinced that much of the former Taliban regime's leadership -- along with leaders of Al-Qaeda -- are operating in the lawless Afghan-Pakistani border region.... (more)