news.bbc.co.uk...

At least one person has been killed and several injured in a suicide attack on Pakistani security forces in the troubled city of Peshawar, police say.

Officers said an attacker threw a grenade at a police checkpoint and the suicide bomber blew himself up

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AP) — Pakistani tribesmen avenging a mosque attack surrounded two militant strongholds and destroyed the homes of some Taliban commanders, an official said Monday as the death toll in the fighting hit 13.

As many as 1,600 tribesmen have joined a citizens' militia in Upper Dir district — an indication of rising anti-Taliban sentiment in Pakistan as the military pursues its offensive against the militant group in the nearby Swat Valley.

The militias, known as lashkars, were focusing on two villages known as Taliban strongholds, said Khaista Rehman, a local police chief. Officials said Sunday the tribesmen had managed to clear three other villages.

Authorities in southern Afghanistan said local and foreign troops have killed as many as 60 Taliban militants in the past week, as part of a stepped up anti-insurgency operation. And about 7,000 additional U.S. troops have begun deploying across volatile southern Afghanistan.


Deployment of additional American troops in Afghan border areas has worried Pakistani officials. They have long maintained the militancy in Pakistan has gained strength from insurgents who have been fleeing the U.S-led offensive in Afghanistan and taking refuge in Pakistani border areas.

Pakistan tribe agrees to hand over Taliban

KHAR, Pakistan (AP) — A tribe in a Pakistani region where the military has fought insurgents has agreed to stop sheltering foreign fighters and hand over local Taliban leaders, authorities said. Pakistan has previously signed such pacts with tribes in its northwest regions bordering Afghanistan, and they tend to unravel.

But Monday's agreement in the Bajur tribal area came after the army said it had defeated insurgents there after six months of fighting. Bajur is a rumored hiding place of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, and the offensive there has earned praise from American officials who are concerned that militants use Pakistan as a base from which to plan attacks in Afghanistan.

US sacks top military commander in Afghanistan

The top US military commander in Afghanistan was sacked today after both the Pentagon and the White House decided that “fresh thinking” was needed to win the war. General David McKiernan, who has spent just 11 months in charge of Nato forces in Afghanistan, will be replaced by Lieutenant-General Stanley McChrystal who previously led the special operations command and is credited with killing the leader of Al-Qaeda in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Lieutenant-General David Rodriguez will be handed a new position of deputy commander of US forces in Afghanistan.

BANNU,Pakistan, June 11 (Reuters) - The Pakistani army attacked an area bordering a militant stronghold near the Waziristan tribal region on Thursday, killing scores of Taliban fighters with helicopter gunships and artillery shelling, officials said.

Already in the final stages of an operation to clear Islamist fighters from the Swat valley, far to the northwest and closer to Islamabad, the military said it went on the offensive in Bannu district after up to 800 militants infiltrated from Waziristan.