Dawn Report

Outrage over Quetta massacre erupted all over the country on Sunday with people expressing solidarity with the Hazara community and demanding immediate steps to punish the culprits.

Demonstrations and sit-ins were held in most cities and towns in the country. There were calls for handing over Quetta to army to protect the life and property of the people, particularly of the Hazara Shia community...

By Our Staff Reporter

ISLAMABAD, Feb 17: Pakistan and Palestine on Sunday agreed to form a joint commission comprising foreign ministers of the two states to expand bilateral ties in economic, agricultural, banking, social and cultural sectors.

The commission would begin its work soon, President Asif Ali Zardari told his Palestinian counterpart Mahmoud Abbas when during a meeting at the presidency the latter expressed the desire to take bilateral cooperation to new areas...

By Madiha Sattar

KARACHI: They are Pakistanis, Afghans, Arabs, Germans, Turks, Libyans, Sudanese, Uzbeks, Kyrgyz and Uighurs. They operate from Bajaur in the north to the Waziristans in the south. And the areas they target range from Pakistan and its neighbourhood, including Afghanistan, Uzbekistan and China, to the Middle East, Europe and the United States.

In the event that civil war breaks out next door or the Afghan Taliban capture significant power after the Western withdrawal, will Afghanistan become a new safe haven for this motley crew of Fata-based militant groups?

By Habib Khan Ghori

KARACHI, Feb 17: The Muttahida Qaumi Movement which announced on Saturday that it was quitting the provincial and federal governments, offered to the opposition in the Sindh Assembly on Sunday to work out a plan to achieve the rights of the deprived and oppressed people of the province and put it on the road to progress and prosperity.

This was stated by Muhammad Raza Haroon, who led an MQM delegation which held talks with PML-F leaders at the residence of its provincial general secretary Imtiaz Ahmad Shaikh...

By Our Staff Reporter

ISLAMABAD, Feb 17: The Canadian Border Security Agency (CBSA) is likely to assume a major role in developing the tribal region on both sides of the Pakistan-Afghan border, upgrading entry posts and monitoring the movement along the border after withdrawal of coalition forces from Afghanistan next year.

A senior government official told Dawn that a nine-member CBSA delegation headed by Canadian High Commissioner Randolph Mank would hold meetings with Pakistani officials this week to assess investment required for the development of the tribal region...

By Anwar Iqbal

WASHINGTON, Feb 17: A team of senior defence officials is coming to Washington this week for talks which will focus on replenishing US-supplied weapons for Pakistan, official sources told Dawn.

The sources said the United States had agreed to continue reimbursing Pakistan from the Coalition Support Fund despite strong objections from some lawmakers...

By Our Correspondent

MIRAMSHAH, Feb 17: Four soldiers were wounded in a bomb explosion in North Waziristan on Sunday, officials said.

The remote-controlled bomb was planted on a road leading to Razmak Town and it went off when an army convoy was passing through the area...

By Nabeel Anwar Dhakku

CHAKWAL, Feb 17: Deputy Prime Minister Chaudhry Pervez Elahi said on Sunday that billions of rupees belonging to the poor people of Punjab had been frittered away on ‘ill-conceived and useless schemes’ by the Shahbaz Sharif government.

Addressing a big public meeting at the Talagang Government Degree College, the provincial PML-Q chief, who is set to contest election for the National Assembly constituency NA-61 (Chakwal II), mentioned the major development projects launched when he was the chief minister and said he would change the fate of the people of the area after coming into power...

By Our Correspondent

NEW DELHI, Feb 17: About an hour before going to the gallows at Delhi’s Tihar Jail, the Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru had written to his family to be bold and proud on the stature he had attained in the death sentence, The Hindu said in its web report on Sunday.

Guru’s wife Tabbasum handed over a copy of the letter to The Hindu on Sunday. She had received her husband’s hand-written letter last week but opened it exclusively for this newspaper on Sunday...

KARACHI, Feb 17: A day after the Muttahida Qaumi Movement announced parting ways with the Pakistan People’s Party, its 11 provincial ministers, an adviser, a special assistant and a coordinator to the chief minister tendered their resignations on Sunday.

However, it appeared that the federal ministers of the MQM were not in a hurry to quit their offices. According to an MQM spokesman, they would submit their resignations on Monday...

UMERKOT, Feb 17: The District Bar Association of Umerkot will meet on Monday to take action against a lawyer who has been accused of serving venison to the Chief Justice of Sindh High Court and other judges at a reception hosted by the association.

Besides Chief Justice Mushir Alam, the reception was attended by Justice Faisal Arab, Justice Aftab Ahmed Borar, Justice Salahuddin Panhwar, Registrar Abdul Malik Gaddi and Additional Registrar Altaf Hussain Gaddi...

By Khawar Ghumman

ISLAMABAD, Feb 17: President Asif Ali Zardari has summoned the National Assembly and the Senate to meet on Monday afternoon.

It will be the 50th and most likely the last sitting of the National Assembly before it completes its five-year term on March 16 and the Senate will be meeting for its 91st session...

KABUL, Feb 17: Nato would work with the country’s defence leadership to implement a ban by President Hamid Karzai on Afghan forces using Nato air strikes in residential areas, the new Nato commander in Afghanistan, US General Joseph Dunford, said on Sunday.

Mr Karzai announced on Saturday that he would issue a decree banning Afghan security forces from requesting Nato air strikes on “Afghan homes or villages”, following the deaths of 10 civilians in the eastern province of Kunar last Wednesday...

TEHRAN, Feb 17: Iran’s official news agency says the country’s navy plans to establish a new base near Pakistan’s border in the Sea of Oman.

The IRNA report on Sunday quotes Admiral Habibollah Sayyari as saying that the base will be built in Pasabandar, about 30km west of Pakistani port of Gwadar...