Pakistan’s Former PM Imran Khan Arrested in Islamabad

THE GUARDIAN: Khan taken into custody as he appeared in court to face charges in a corruption case

Imran Khan, the former prime minister of Pakistan, has been arrested by the military as he appeared in court in Islamabad to face charges in a corruption case. » | Agencies in Islamabad | Tuesday, May 9, 2023

ALSO READ:

Imran Khan, Pakistan’s Ex-Leader, Is Arrested: Mr. Khan, a former cricket star, has staged a comeback since being ousted, openly challenging the powerful military. His detention raises fears of mass protests. »


LIRE AUSSI :

Au Pakistan, l’ex-premier ministre Imran Khan arrêté au tribunal : L’arrestation d’Imran Khan survient au lendemain de la mise en garde de l’armée contre « les allégations sans fondement » prononcées, selon elle, par l’ex-premier ministre. »

Pakistan : des tirs de gaz lacrymogènes contre les manifestants après l'arrestation d'Imran Khan : L'ancien premier ministre comparaissait devant un tribunal d'Islamabad pour l'une des nombreuses affaires le visant depuis qu'il a été chassé du pouvoir en avril 2022. »

LESEN SIE AUCH :

Pakistans früherer Ministerpräsident Imran Khan festgenommen: Seit seinem Sturz im vergangenen Jahr laufen zahlreiche Korruptionsverfahren gegen Imran Khan. Der wittert eine Verschwörung des Militärs. Nun wurde Khan in einer undurchsichtigen Aktion festgenommen. »

The Radical Cleric Building a Militia in the Heart of Islamabad

Cleric Maulana Abdul Aziz shows religious books to the media
during a news conference in Islamabad on Friday.

THE SUNDAY TELEGRAPH: Maulana Abdul Aziz, the cleric of the Red Mosque and one of the most dangerous men in Pakistan, tells the Telegraph if the country does not implement Islamic law, he and his followers “will solve it”.

He is one of the most dangerous men in Pakistan and is supposed to be in police detention.

Instead, as several thousand hardline Muslim worshippers knelt in prayer at the Red Mosque in the heart of Islamabad, the voice of Maulana Abdul Aziz called out over them defiantly.

Seven years ago, the radical cleric led heavily armed al-Qaeda gunmen in a bloody siege at the Red Mosque, or Lal Masjid in Urdu, which left more than a hundred children, soldiers and militants dead.

The brutal denouement, including the killing of his brother and son, set off a wave of Taliban suicide bombings which struck at the heart of Pakistan's military establishment.

Now Pakistan’s intelligence services believe he is building a new militia, grabbing land for more madrassas and preparing for another tilt at forcing the country to adopt strict Islamic law. Eyewitnesses said they had seen 30 to 40 heavily armed men from the militant group Sipah-e-Sahaba inside the mosque.

Once again, he is a reminder that one of the West's most important allies against the forces of terror has a problem dealing with militant voices even in the middle of its own capital. In December, a Pakistani court issued an arrest warrant for Aziz but the police have been unable to enforce it. “We are trying out best to implement it,” a police official said. » | Dean Nelson, Islamabad | Sunday, February 08, 2015

Islamic Militants Threaten War on Pakistan over Kashmir
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Islamic militants fighting Indian forces in Kashmir will declare war on Pakistan if it weakens its traditional support for their jihad, their senior leader has warned.

Syed Salahuddin, leader of the United Jihad Council, an umbrella group of Kashmiri militant groups which includes the Lashkar e Taiba, said they had been fighting "Pakistan's war in Kashmir" but Islamabad now cares more about trade than jihad.

"We (militants) are fighting Pakistan's war in Kashmir and if it withdraws its support, the war would be fought inside Pakistan," he said in an interview with the Arab News.

His threat emerged as India and Pakistan's leaders prepare for talks in Islamabad on Monday on proposals to withdraw their troops from the disputed Siachen Glacier, the world's highest battlefield close to the Line of Control which divides Kashmir.

Salahuddin and other Kashmiri militant leaders fear Pakistan's leaders will withdraw its long-standing support for the military strikes against Indian forces in Kashmir as part of its diplomatic campaign to reduce trade barriers and ease movement between the old enemies. » | Dean Nelson, New Delhi | Friday, June 08, 2012

Washington Gasps at Hillary Charm-el-shake Offensive that Leaves Islamabad Stunned
THE TIMES OF INDIA: WASHINGTON: It was supposed to be a charm offensive, but as the day wore on she put away her charm and went on the offensive. Secretary of State

Hillary Clinton’s public dressing down of Pakistan during a three-day visit there, including virtually accusing the country of complicity with al-Qaida, has shaken Washington as much as it stunned her hosts.

"Her inner voice became her outer voice," Martha Raddatz, a veteran NBC correspondent said on the network, explaining that while many in the administration believed what she said to be true (that Pakistan is coddling terrorists), it was rare for America's top diplomat to say it publicly. Officials in Washington were trying to keep a straight face, but there were a few gasps, she added.

Clinton's blunt remarks came during a pow-wow with half-dozen combative senior Pakistani journalists who harried her about US policy in the region.

"Al-Qaida has had safe haven in Pakistan since 2002," she finally asserted when challenged about Washington’s tough prescriptions for Islamabad. "I find it hard to believe that nobody in your government knows where they are and couldn't get them if they really wanted to."

After having publicly doubted the bona fides of her hosts, she added, as an afterthought: "Maybe that's the case; maybe they're not gettable...I don't know. As far as we know, they are in Pakistan." At one point during the exchanges, when a journalist spoke about all the services rendered by Pakistan for the US, Mrs Clinton snapped, "We have also given you billions."

The US Secretary of State also took a swipe at the Pakistani military and intelligence agencies, telling the senior journalists, "If we are going to have a mature partnership where we work together" then "there are issues that not just the United States but others have with your government and with your military security establishment." She said she was "more than willing to hear every complaint about the United States'' but the relationship had to be a "two-way street." >>> Chidanand Rajghatta, TNN | Friday, October 30, 2009

Why Are We Dealing with These People? Let them Go Their Way!
THE NEW YORK TIMES: KARACHI, Pakistan — Judith A. McHale was expecting a contentious session with Ansar Abbasi, a Pakistani journalist known for his harsh criticism of American foreign policy, when she sat down for a one-on-one meeting with him in a hotel conference room in Islamabad on Monday. She got that, and a little bit more.

After Ms. McHale, the Obama administration’s new under secretary of state for public diplomacy and public affairs, gave her initial polite presentation about building bridges between America and the Muslim world, Mr. Abbasi thanked her politely for meeting with him. Then he told her that he hated her.

“ ‘You should know that we hate all Americans,’ ” Ms. McHale said Mr. Abbasi told her. “ ‘From the bottom of our souls, we hate you.’ ”

Beyond the continuation of the battle against militants along the Pakistani-Afghan border, a big part of President Obama’s strategy for the region involves trying to broaden America’s involvement in the country to include nonmilitary areas like infrastructure development, trade, energy, schools and jobs — all aimed at convincing the Pakistani people that the United States is their friend. But as Ms. McHale and other American officials discovered this week, during a visit by Richard C. Holbrooke, the special representative to Pakistan and Afghanistan, making that case was not going to be easy.

“We have made a major turn with our relationship with Pakistan under President Obama,” Mr. Holbrooke told reporters at a news conference in Karachi on Wednesday. Time and again, Mr. Holbrooke tried to delineate the differences between the Obama administration and the Bush era, painting the new administration as one that wants to see a better life and more business opportunities for Pakistanis.

He said his very presence in Karachi — Pakistan’s largest city and its commercial capital — demonstrated that drone attacks and the hunt for Al Qaeda were not the only American foreign policy activities in the country.

To polite applause, Mr. Holbrooke told local officials at the Governor’s House that the United States Consulate in Karachi would start granting business visas —100 a week — instead of making would-be business travelers to the United States go to Islamabad for the visas, as has been the case.

He stopped at a shantytown in the city to chat with schoolboys crowded into three classrooms, and even visited the home of a local resident, to get a feel for how people in Karachi live. On Tuesday, he met with opposition leaders in Islamabad, including Liaqat Baloch, the secretary general of the anti-American political party Jamaat-e-Islami, and Fazlur Rehman, the leader of another anti-American party, Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, who is sometimes referred to as the spiritual founder of the Taliban.

In Karachi on Wednesday, Mr. Holbrooke kept bringing up a trade bill that just passed the House, which would set up so-called reconstruction opportunity zones so that textiles and other goods made in Pakistan’s tribal areas could get preferential access to the United States market. And Ms. McHale, whose job is, in part, to try to repair America’s relations with the Muslim world, strayed from his side only when she ventured out on fence-mending missions of her own, meeting with 17 Pakistani journalists, 8 officials of nongovernmental organizations and members of several political parties, all in an effort to deliver one message: America cares about Pakistan.

But Mr. Abbasi’s reaction — a response that, Ms. McHale acknowledged, apparently reflects the feelings of about 25 percent of the population, according to a recent poll — demonstrated just how tough the job is. For all of the administration’s efforts to call attention to the nonmilitary ties that would bind the two countries, America is still being judged by many Pakistanis as an uncaring behemoth whose sole concern is finding Osama bin Laden, no matter the cost in civilian Pakistani lives. U.S. Officials Get a Taste of Pakistanis’ Anger at America >>> Helene Cooper | Wednesday, August 19, 2009

Taliban-Style Justice Stirs Growing Anger
THE WASHINGTON POST: Sharia Being Perverted*, Pakistanis Say

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, May 9 -- When black-turbaned Taliban fighters demanded in January that Islamic sharia law be imposed in Pakistan's Swat Valley, few alarm bells went off in this Muslim nation of about 170 million.

Sharia, after all, is the legal framework that guides the lives of all Muslims.

Officials said people in Swat were fed up with the slow and corrupt state courts, scholars said the sharia system would bring swift justice, and commentators said critics in the West had no right to interfere.

Today, with hundreds of thousands of people fleeing Swat and Pakistani troops launching an offensive to drive out the Taliban forces, the pendulum of public opinion has swung dramatically. The threat of "Talibanization" is being denounced in Parliament and on opinion pages, and the original defenders of an agreement that authorized sharia in Swat are in sheepish retreat.

The refugees are the "victims of ignorant cavemen masquerading as fighters of Islam," columnist Shafqat Mahmood charged in the News International newspaper Friday. He said that the "barbarian horde" that invaded Swat never intended to implement a sharia-based judicial system and that they just used it as cover. "This is a fight for power, not Islam," he wrote. >>> By Pamela Constable | Sunday, May 10, 2009

*Not so perverted! The Taliban are merely following the straight path (of Allah) – as-Sirat al-Mustaqim! – Mark

L'armée pakistanaise reprend une ville clé aux talibans
L'armée pakistanaise aux alentours de Rustam, près du district de Buner. Photo grâce au Figaro
LE FIGARO: Islamabad a repris l'initiative militaire en traquant les insurgés islamistes installés dans la vallée de Buner, à une centaine de kilomètres de la capitale.

La reprise des hostilités était inéluctable. Pressé par la ­communauté internationale, les Américains en tête, de déloger les talibans du district de Buner où ils étaient entrés la semaine ­dernière, le gouvernement d'Islamabad a fait donner l'assaut mardi soir.

Dans une semaine, le président pakistanais, Asif Ali Zardari, rencontrera à Washington Barack Obama et son homologue afghan, Hamid Karzaï. Il ne ­pouvait pas arriver les mains vides à ce mini-sommet «Af-Pak», qui doit durer deux jours. Zardari sait qu'il lui sera notamment demandé des comptes sur la manière dont le Pakistan entend utiliser l'aide promise par les États-Unis, actuellement en débat au Congrès américain. Outre les 7,5 milliards de dollars sur cinq ans prévus, le Congrès délibère sur une aide d'urgence comprise entre 200 et 400 millions de dollars.

Mercredi, le porte-parole de l'armée pakistanaise, le général Athar Abbas, a annoncé une première victoire. «Des troupes héliportées sont parvenues à sécuriser Daggar, le chef-lieu du district de Buner, et ses environs», a-t-il déclaré. Cinquante rebelles auraient été tués. «Nous avons vu un hélicoptère larguer des soldats sur les collines, tôt le matin. Il a effectué six ou sept rotations», a confirmé un commerçant du marché central à Daggar. Depuis mardi, des avions de chasse et des hélicoptères de combat ­couvrent l'avancée des troupes au sol. Mais, a expliqué le général Abbas, «nous sommes ralentis par le fait que les insurgés ­retiennent une partie de la population en otage. Nous faisons de notre mieux pour qu'il y ait le moins de pertes humaines possible et le minimum de civils forcés de fuir». >>> Marie-France Calle, correspondanteà New Delhi | Jeudi 30 Avril 2009

Pakistan : l'armée lance une offensive contre des talibans
LE FIGARO: Jusqu'à un million de personnes ont pris les routes de l'exode pour fuir ces combats.

Deux jours après une première contre-attaque initiée dimanche dans le district du Lower Dir, l'armée pakistanaise a annoncé mardi qu'elle avait entamé mardi la reconquête de Buner, un autre lieu hautement symbolique, situé à une centaine de km d'Islamabad.

«L'objectif est l'élimination ou l'expulsion» des 400 à 500 «combattants islamistes», a expliqué le général Athar Abbas, porte-parole de l'armée pakistanaise.

La semaine dernière, les talibans avaient déclenché un tollé dans la communauté internationale mais aussi dans l'opinion publique pakistanaise en s'emparant de Buner, au mépris d'un accord de cessez-le-feu signé en février avec le gouvernement, qui avait concédé, en échange, l'instauration de tribunaux islamiques dans la région. >>> lefigaro.fr (avec AFP) | Mardi 28 Avril 2009

Pakistan Warns Taliban to Quit Buner or Face Action
REUTERS: ISLAMABAD - Pakistan warned the Taliban on Tuesday it would expand a military offensive to Buner, a district around 100 km (60 miles) northwest of Islamabad, if the guerrillas did not withdraw from the area.

Interior Minister Rehman Malik said around 450 Taliban were reported to have sneaked into Buner on Monday.

"I warn them to vacate the area. We are not going to spare them," he told reporters.

"Action will be taken if anyone tries to block our efforts to re-establish writ of the government in Buner and other areas," he said. >>> Reporting by Zeeshan Haider; Editing by David Fox | Tuesday, April 28, 2009

New Dark Age Alert! Taliban Gunmen Shooting Couple Dead for Adultery Caught on Camera
Are these the tribal savages Obama wants to do business with?

By now, it should be becoming increasingly obvious to all that Islam is a ‘religion’ neither of peace nor love. Do not let your cowardly politicians fool you!

Further, be sure of this: Wherever Islam spreads, and whenever it becomes stronger in numbers, its adherents become ever more emboldened. If you think that this sort of brutality and savagery couldn’t happen in the West, you are GREATLY mistaken. – ©Mark

THE TELEGRAPH: Taliban gunmen have been filmed executing a surprised couple whom they repeatedly shot for the alleged crime of adultery.


Their deaths were squalid, riddled with bullets in a field near their home by Taliban gunmen as the execution was captured on a mobile telephone.

In footage which is being watched with horror by Pakistanis, the couple try to flee when they realise what is about to happen. But a gunman casually shoots the man and then the woman in the back with a burst of gunfire, leaving them bleeding in the dirt.

Moments later, when others in the execution party shout out that they are still alive, he returns to coldly finish them with a few more rounds.

Their "crime" was an alleged affair in their remote mountain village controlled by militants in an area that was only recently under the government's sway. It was the kind of barbarity that has become increasingly familiar across Pakistan as the Taliban tide has spread.

But this time, with black-turbaned gunmen almost at the gates of Islamabad, the rare footage has shown urban Pakistanis what could now await them.

Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the United States Joint Chiefs of Staff, has warned that Islamic extremists could take over the nation. >>> By Saeed Shah in Islamabad | Saturday, April 25, 2009

Alarm Grows Over Pakistan’s Failure to Halt Militant Gains
Taliban militants on Thursday outside a mosque where tribal elders and members of the Taliban met in Daggar, the main town in the Buner district of Pakistan. Photo courtesy of The New York Times
THE NEW YORK TIMES: ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — With 400 to 500 Taliban fighters newly in control of a strategically important district just 70 miles from here, Pakistani authorities have deployed only a poorly paid and equipped constabulary force — numbering just several hundred — to the area.

The Taliban appeared to be consolidating control in the district, Buner, on Thursday after moving in and establishing checkpoints on Wednesday. Residents said Taliban militants held a meeting, or jirga, with local elders and the local administration on Thursday. The residents said the meeting yielded a truce similar to the one reached with local leaders in the Swat Valley, which resulted in the agreement by the government of President Asif Ali Zardari to allow the imposition of Islamic law there 10 days ago.

“This concession represents a serious development and reflects both the growing strength of the Pakistani Taliban and the inability of the Pakistani army to conduct successful counterinsurgency operations,” said Senator Jack Reed, a Rhode Island Democrat on the Armed Services Committee who just returned from his fifth visit to Pakistan.

The fall of Buner has raised new international alarm about the ability of the Pakistani government to fend off an unrelenting Taliban advance from the Swat Valley, where as part of the truce agreement, the Pakistani Army remains in its barracks. The Taliban have moved to within a few hours’ drive of Islamabad, the capital of this country, and the neighboring garrison city of Rawalpindi.

The Pakistani military does not have a presence in Buner, Pakistani and Western officials said. From the hills of the district, the Taliban have access to the flatlands of the district of Swabi, which lead directly to the four-lane highway that connects Islamabad and Peshawar, the capital of North-West Frontier Province, where much of the Pakistani Taliban operate. >>> By Jane Perlez and Zubair Shah | Thursday, April 23, 2009

Pakistan – NWFP: Swat Taliban Consolidate Grip over Buner
Istiqbal Khan, a parliamentarian from Buner, told the AP that the militants had entered the district in ‘large numbers’ and started setting up checkpoints at main roads and strategic positions.—AP. Photo courtesy of Dawn
DAWN.COM: ISLAMABAD: Taliban militants are setting up checkpoints in a district next to Swat Valley, officials and witnesses said Wednesday, spurring fears that a government-backed peace deal imposing Islamic law in the area has emboldened the insurgents to expand their reign.

Reports that the top government official in another adjacent district was kidnapped by militants added to the growing concern.

Pakistan’s president signed off on the peace pact last week in hopes of calming Swat, where some two years worth of clashes between the Taliban and security forces have killed hundreds and displaced up to a third of the one-time tourist haven’s 1.5 million residents.

The agreement covers the Malakand region, which comprises roughly one-third of NWFP, a strategic stretch that runs along the Afghan border and bumps into the tribal areas where al Qaeda and the Taliban reportedly have strongholds.

Supporters say the deal was the best way to bring peace, and that it also addresses long-time local grievances over the inefficient regular judicial system. Critics, including the White House, have slammed the deal as an affront to democracy and human rights, saying it gives militants a state-sanctioned sanctuary.

Some critics go as far as to say that Swat could be the first domino to fall — that Islamabad, which is less than a hundred miles away, could follow along with other segments of the country that neighbours Afghanistan. >>> | Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Pakistan Taleban Take Over Towns as They Move Closer to Islamabad
The Swat Valley has been transformed into a Taleban stronghold from which the movement is extending its influence. Photo courtesy of TimesOnline
TIMESONLINE: The Taleban seized towns less than 65 miles from Pakistan’s capital yesterday, renewing fears that Islamabad’s recent peace deal with the radicals would only accelerate their advance across the country.

The peace accord had already drawn harsh criticism from Pakistan’s Western allies. “I think that the Pakistani Government is basically abdicating to the Taleban and to the extremists,” Hillary Clinton, the US Secretary of States, said yesterday. She added that the situation in Pakistan “poses a mortal threat to the security of our country and the world”.

Mrs Clinton gave her gloomy assessment to the US Congress shortly after hundreds of Taleban fighters occupied government buildings in the district of Buner, ransacking the offices of international aid agencies and taking away vehicles, computers and other equipment. Some employees were also taken hostage briefly.

The militants, carrying rocket launchers and machineguns, also set up checkpoints to search vehicles as many residents fled the area. Local security forces remained confined to police stations and camps.

The fundamentalist movement struck a peace deal with Islamabad recently after a terror campaign in the neighbouring Swat Valley. Under the agreement the militants were allowed to establish an Islamist administration and Sharia courts. In return it was supposed to disarm but has failed to do so. >>> Zahid Hussain in Mingora | Thursday, April 23, 2009

Islamabad Suicide Bombing: Westerners Fear for Their Future in Pakistan
THE TELEGRAPH: Westerners and foreign companies were considering their future in Pakistan yesterday after the country suffered its most devastating terrorist strike since the assassination of Benazir Bhutto.

Expatriates said they saw the attack on the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad as a watershed moment with its deliberate targeting of a local landmark where diplomats, politicians and the middle classes gather for business meetings, or to exercise at its gymnasium and dine out.

It came after a string of suicide bombings across the country had already forced the cancellation of an international cricket tournament.

Many who had dismissed these smaller attacks are now considering leaving. "I'll be speaking to my boss tomorrow," said a Briton who has worked in Islamabad for a Pakistani firm for several years and did not want to be named.

There are currently 150 British staff working for the High Commission in the Pakistan capital, making it one of the largest in the world.

The mission – two of whose staff were injured in the attack – is still expected to function as normal. However, employees are being relocated within a safe diplomatic enclave as part of long-term plan initiated since Pakistan's security began to deteriorate significantly last year. Islamabad Suicide Bombing: Westerners Fear for Their Future in Pakistan >>> By Isambard Wilkinson | September 22, 2008

THE TELEGRAPH:
Pakistan Leaders Escaped Marriott Bomb at Last Minute: Pakistan's president and prime minister were scheduled to eat at the Islamabad Marriott the night it was bombed, but changed plans at the last minute, a top official has said. >>> By Isambard Wilkinson in Islamabad | September 22, 2008

NZZ Online:
Attentat auf Marriott-Hotel galt dem Präsidenten: Pakistan Staatsspitze beinahe getroffen >>> | 22. September 2008

LE FIGARO:
Al-Qaida défie l'Occident
en frappant au Pakistan >>> Marie-France Calle à New Delhi | 22.09.2008

DIE PRESSE:
Anschlag in Pakistan – ein Land am Abgrund: Mit ihrem Anschlag auf das Marriott-Hotel in Islamabad wollten Fanatiker Pakistan ins Herz treffen. Sie sehen die Zeit gekommen, den Atomstaat zu kippen. Doch die Stimmung könnte sich nun gegen sie wenden.

DELHI/ISLAMABAD. Es sind Bilder wie aus einem Kriegsgebiet: Am Tag nach dem verheerenden Selbstmordattentat auf das Marriott-Hotel in Islamabad stießen Rettungskräfte in den verkohlten Trümmern immer noch auf Leichen. Ein zehn Meter tiefer Bombenkrater klaffte vor den rauchenden Ruinen des US-Luxus-Hotels.

Die Terroristen wollten den pakistanischen Staat mitten ins Herz treffen. Das Inferno spielte sich nahe dem Machtzentrum des Landes ab, wo sich der Sitz des Präsidenten, das Parlament und das Oberste Gericht befinden. Nun erwägen mehrere Botschaften, die Familien ihrer Mitarbeiter aus Pakistan abzuziehen. Das Land würde damit als genauso gefährlich eingestuft wie Afghanistan und der Irak. >>> Von Sascha Zastiral | 21. September 2008

The Dawning of a New Dark Age – Paperback (US) Barnes & Noble >>>
The Dawning of a New Dark Age – Hardcover (US) Barnes & Noble >>>
The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Taschenbuch) >>>
The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Gebundene Ausgabe) >>>
The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Broché) >>>
The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Relié) >>>

Islamabad Hotel Blast ‘Was Pakistan’s 9/11’
THE TELEGRAPH: Security guards at the hotel shattered by a suicide blast in Pakistan launched a frantic attempt to prevent the truck bomb detonating in the minutes before it exploded, killing at least 53 people.


CCTV footage released yesterday showed the truck carrying the biggest ever bomb used by terrorists in Pakistan being driven into the gates of the Marriott hotel in Islamabad on Saturday evening.

The driver detonated the bomb, causing a fire in the truck, but the explosion failed to set off an estimated 660kg bomb in the rear of his vehicle.

Guards rushed to extinguish the flames but four minutes later the main bomb went off, blowing apart the hotel and leaving a crater 24ft deep [7m] and 59ft [18m] wide in what was described by local commentators as “Pakistan’s 9/11”.

Among the dead were the Czech Republic’s ambassador, Ivo Zdarek, his Vietnamese fiancée and two American soldiers. A Danish diplomat is still missing.

Six Britons were among almost 300 people injured and two of them – both staff at the British High Commission – remained in hospital last night. Pakistani officials, who accused Taliban leaders allied to al-Qaeda of being responsible for the plot, praised the courage of the guards as the attack unfolded. Islamabard Hotel Blast ‘Was Pakistan’s 9/11’ >>> By Isambard Wilkinson in Islamabad | September 22, 2008

THE TELEGRAPH:
Marriott Bombing in Islamabad Must Wake Pakistan Up >>> | September 22, 2008

The Dawning of a New Dark Age – Dust Jacket Hardcover, direct from the publishers (UK) >>>
The Dawning of a New Dark Age – Paperback, direct from the publishers (UK) >>>

Pakistani President: The “Cancer” of Terrorism
Watch BBC video: Eyewitness Dirome Antony describes the moment the bomb struck >>>
BBC: Pakistan's president has pledged to fight the "cancer" of terrorism after a suicide bomb killed at least 40 people in the capital, Islamabad.

In a televised speech, Asif Ali Zardari appealed to "all democratic forces" to help to save Pakistan.

The bomb, at the Marriott Hotel, left a 20ft (6m) crater. The hotel owner said a lorry blew up as it was being checked by security at the entrance.

US President George W Bush condemned the attack and pledged assistance.

He said it was a "reminder of the ongoing threat faced by Pakistan, the United States, and all those who stand against violent extremism".

He said the US would "assist Pakistan in confronting this threat and bringing the perpetrators to justice".

'Tonne of explosives'

The blast destroyed the entire front section of the hotel and brought down the ceiling of the banqueting hall.

Witnesses described a scene of horror as blood-covered bodies were pulled from the wreckage and guests and staff ran for cover from shattered glass. Terror Pledge after Pakistan Bomb >>> | September 20, 2008

The Dawning of a New Dark Age – Paperback (US) Barnes & Noble >>>
The Dawning of a New Dark Age – Hardcover (US) Barnes & Noble >>>