DTN News - The Story of Malala Yousafzai

DTN News - The Story of Malala Yousafzai

(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - July 12, 2013: Malala Yousafzai gives her first speech since the Taliban in Pakistan tried to kill her for advocating education for girls, at the United Nations Headquarters in New York, July 12, 2013. 

REUTERS/Brendan McDermid

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DTN News - PAKISTAN NEWS: Imran Khan Injured After He Falls During Rally In Lahore

DTN News - PAKISTAN NEWS: Imran Khan Injured After He Falls During Rally In Lahore

(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - May 7, 2013:  Pakistani politician and former cricketer Imran Khan was rushed to hospital with head injuries on Tuesday after falling off a lift taking him onto the stage for an election rally, his party said.

Television footage showed Khan, leader of the Pakistan Movement for Justice party (PTI), bleeding from the head as he was carried by aides through the crowd at the event in Pakistan's second largest city Lahore.

The dramatic development came at the end of a day that saw 17 people killed and dozens more wounded in bomb attacks in northwest Pakistan, taking the death toll in the bloody campaign for Saturday's general election past 100.

The poll will mark a democratic milestone in a country ruled for half its history by the military as the first time a civilian government has served a full term and handed over to another through the ballot box.

Khan, who won only one seat in 2002 and boycotted polls in 2008, has led an electric campaign, galvanising the middle class and young people in what he has called a "tsunami" of support that will propel him into office.

The 63-year-old, who has undertaken a punishing schedule of daily rallies, tumbled from a riser along with several of his staff, seemingly after one of them lost their balance.

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http://defense-technologynews.blogspot.ca/2013/05/dtn-news-pakistan-news-imran-khan.html

DTN News - AFGHAN WAR NEWS: New Pakistan Outreach Could Aid Afghan Peace Deal

DTN News - AFGHAN WAR NEWS: New Pakistan Outreach Could Aid Afghan Peace Deal

(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - October 28, 2012: In this Aug. 5, 2012 file photo, Pakistani Taliban patrol in their stronghold of Shawal in the Pakistani tribal region of South Waziristan. 

Pakistan has stepped up outreach to some of its biggest enemies in Afghanistan, a significant policy shift that could prove crucial to U.S.-backed efforts to strike a peace deal in the war-torn country.

The target of the diplomatic push has mainly been non-Pashtun political leaders who have been at odds with Pakistan for years because of the country's historical support for the Afghan Taliban, a Pashtun movement. 

(AP Photo/ Ishtiaq Mahsud, File)  

(Read complete story on Defense-Technology News - Click on link undermentioned)

http://defense-technologynews.blogspot.ca/2012/10/dtn-news-afghan-war-news-new-pakistan.html

DTN News - PAKISTAN NEWS: Taliban Shoot Pakistani Schoolgirl Campaigning For Peace

DTN News - PAKISTAN NEWS: Taliban Shoot Pakistani Schoolgirl Campaigning For Peace

(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - October 9, 2012: Taliban gunmen in Pakistan shot and seriously wounded on Tuesday a 14-year-old schoolgirl who rose to fame for speaking out against the militants, authorities said.

Malala Yousufzai was shot in the head and neck when gunmen fired on her school bus in the Swat valley, northwest of the capital, Islamabad. Two other girls were also wounded, police said.

Yousufzai became famous for speaking out against the Pakistani Taliban at a time when even the government seemed to be appeasing the hardline Islamists.

The government agreed to a ceasefire with the Taliban in Swat in early 2009, effectively recognizing insurgent control of the valley whose lakes and mountains had long been a tourist attraction.

The Taliban set up courts, executed residents and closed girls' schools, including the one that Yousufzai attended. A documentary team filmed her weeping as she explained her ambition to be a doctor.

(Read complete story on Defense-Technology News - Click on link undermentioned)

http://defense-technologynews.blogspot.ca/2012/10/dtn-news-pakistan-news-taliban-shoot.html

DTN News - PAKISTAN TALIBAN NEWS: Kidnapped Swiss Couple 'Escape' Pakistani Taliban After Eight Months In Captivity

DTN News - PAKISTAN TALIBAN NEWS: Kidnapped Swiss Couple 'Escape' Pakistani Taliban After Eight Months In Captivity

(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada – March 15, 2012:  Swiss couple David Och and Daniela Widmer wave upon their arrival at Qasim military base in Rawalpindi, Pakistan on Thursday, March 15, 2012. 

A Swiss couple held captive for nearly a year by the Taliban in Pakistan turned up at an army post close to the Afghan border on Thursday, claiming to have escaped from their captors, the Pakistani army said. They were swiftly flown to safety by the military.

http://defense-technologynews.blogspot.com/2012/03/dtn-news-pakistan-taliban-news.html 

DTN News - AFGHAN WAR NEWS: Failing To Learn ~ US Resumes Drone Attacks In Pakistan

DTN News - AFGHAN WAR NEWS: Failing To Learn ~ US Resumes Drone Attacks In Pakistan

 (NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - January 17, 2012: When Pakistan’s Express Tribune wrote this week that the CIA was likely to resume drone strikes for the first time since November, it included a quote from an unnamed Pakistani official saying that Pakistani authorities believed drones were “strategically harmful but tactically advantageous”.  I tweeted the link and asked who would explain to the Pakistani public that the drone strikes – which have fuelled intense anti-Americanism – were seen even in their own country as “tactically advantageous”.

One of the answers was particularly telling. It was from a supporter of the Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf (PTI) of former cricketer Imran Khan – who has risen in popularity on a wave of anti-Americanism, opposition to drone strikes, and belief the government of President Asif Ali Zardari has sold out to the United States. Here is the tweet:

“I find this so infuriating. It is about time the present #Zardari administration was shown the door. #PTI for #Pakistan”

Yet the popular view that American money is being used to bribe Zardari into allowing the country to be attacked by U.S. missiles has no basis in reality. In as much as drone strikes are discussed with Pakistan – and there is a great deal of disagreement about how far they should be used - the “red lines” have been negotiated with the Pakistan Army, which controls foreign and security policy.  Such is the lack of transparency in Pakistan.

But if that seems too strange, then let’s look at the approach in the United States to drones.  We might, perhaps, have expected it to use the pause in drone strikes to improve their transparency. Indeed, given their impact in fuelling anti-Americanism, Washington might have considered publishing some photographs to prove its contention that the drone strikes do not cause the kind of civilian casualties assumed in Pakistan? After all, if Iran could down a drone and gain  access to U.S. technology, how much more can be given away in a photograph?

Yet instead, we had a leaked story from the New York Times that the pause in drone strikes was allowing al Qaeda and Pakistani militants to regroup.  (Note to the U.S. administration – rightly or wrongly, a leaked story in the NYT is seen in Pakistan as a statement of policy so it would be far better to come out and say it yourself.) And sure enough, just days after that story, the United States resumed drone attacks.

http://defense-technologynews.blogspot.com/2012/01/dtn-news-afghan-war-news-failing-to.html