Hundreds of mourners attended funerals yesterday for more than 30 anti-Taliban tribesmen killed in a brazen suicide attack in northwestern Pakistan.
More than 100 people were also wounded on Friday when a militant detonated his explosive-laden vehicle near a crowd of about 500 tribesmen, gathered at Ghaljo village to discuss how to evict insurgents from the area, government official Rehman Khan said.
Officials said earlier 22 people were killed in the attack, but Khan said the death toll rose yesterday after some of the wounded died in hospitals.
Media reports said as many as 50 people were killed.
“According to my information, more than 30 people died in the attack and their funerals were held today,” Khan said, adding residents and elders planned to meet again yesterday to discuss the situation.
Tribal elder Hazrat Noor said the fight against militants would continue.
“We are sad over yesterday’s attack, but God willing we will defeat these terrorists,” he said.
In the nearby Bajur tribal region, where a military offensive against insurgents has raged for two months, four more beheaded bodies of anti-Taliban tribal elders were found yesterday.
That brought to eight the number of beheaded bodies found in two days, government official Jamil Khan said.
All eight were part of a tribal council in the Charmang area that wanted to establish a militia to battle insurgents, he said.
Khan said local tribesman had taken revenge by attacking suspected militant houses.
After the Orakzai attack, Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari vowed to “wipe out the menace of terrorism and extremism from the society,” the state-run Associated Press of Pakistan news agency said.
But in recent weeks, the US has signaled its impatience with Pakistani efforts by apparently stepping up cross-border assaults on alleged militant targets.
The US is suspected in at least 11 missile strikes on the Pakistan side of the Afghan border since mid-August, killing more than 100 people, most of them alleged militants, according to an Associated Press count based on figures provided by Pakistani intelligence officials.
The US rarely confirms or denies the attacks.
Pakistan’s military and civilian leaders have criticized the strikes as violations of their country’s sovereignty.
“We want them [the United States] to realize that these attacks are destabilizing the situation, and they are not helping them or Pakistan,” Pakistani Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammed Sadiq said.
“They are helping the terrorists,” he said.
Nauru has started selling passports to fund climate action, but is so far struggling to attract new citizens to the low-lying, largely barren island in the Pacific Ocean. Nauru, one of the world’s smallest nations, has a novel plan to fund its fight against climate change by selling so-called “Golden Passports.” Selling for US$105,000 each, Nauru plans to drum up more than US$5 million in the first year of the “climate resilience citizenship” program. Almost six months after the scheme opened in February, Nauru has so far approved just six applications — covering two families and four individuals. Despite the slow start —
YELLOW SHIRTS: Many protesters were associated with pro-royalist groups that had previously supported the ouster of Paetongtarn’s father, Thaksin, in 2006 Protesters rallied on Saturday in the Thai capital to demand the resignation of court-suspended Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra and in support of the armed forces following a violent border dispute with Cambodia that killed more than three dozen people and displaced more than 260,000. Gathered at Bangkok’s Victory Monument despite soaring temperatures, many sang patriotic songs and listened to speeches denouncing Paetongtarn and her father, former Thai prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, and voiced their backing of the country’s army, which has always retained substantial power in the Southeast Asian country. Police said there were about 2,000 protesters by mid-afternoon, although
MOGAMI-CLASS FRIGATES: The deal is a ‘big step toward elevating national security cooperation with Australia, which is our special strategic partner,’ a Japanese official said Australia is to upgrade its navy with 11 Mogami-class frigates built by Japan’s Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Australian Minister for Defence Richard Marles said yesterday. Billed as Japan’s biggest defense export deal since World War II, Australia is to pay US$6 billion over the next 10 years to acquire the fleet of stealth frigates. Australia is in the midst of a major military restructure, bolstering its navy with long-range firepower in an effort to deter China. It is striving to expand its fleet of major warships from 11 to 26 over the next decade. “This is clearly the biggest defense-industry agreement that has ever
DEADLY TASTE TEST: Erin Patterson tried to kill her estranged husband three times, police said in one of the major claims not heard during her initial trial Australia’s recently convicted mushroom murderer also tried to poison her husband with bolognese pasta and chicken korma curry, according to testimony aired yesterday after a suppression order lapsed. Home cook Erin Patterson was found guilty last month of murdering her husband’s parents and elderly aunt in 2023, lacing their beef Wellington lunch with lethal death cap mushrooms. A series of potentially damning allegations about Patterson’s behavior in the lead-up to the meal were withheld from the jury to give the mother-of-two a fair trial. Supreme Court Justice Christopher Beale yesterday rejected an application to keep these allegations secret. Patterson tried to kill her
RSS