War News for Friday, March 14, 2014

Reported security incidents
#1: A suicide bomb attack targeting police in northwest Pakistan has killed at least seven people in the latest violence to hit peace talks between the government and Taliban militants. The blast came on Friday in the suburbs of the northwestern city of Peshawar, close to the lawless tribal areas that are a haven for Taliban and al-Qaeda linked militants. The target of the blast was a police armoured personnel carrier, officers said. t least 28 people were also wounded.'

#2: A roadside bomb in the southern Helmand province has killed six civilians, including two women and two children, said a senior Afghan government official. Mohammed Sharif, district chief of Musa Qala district in Helmand, said on Friday that the bomb ripped through a vehicle the previous night, killing everyone inside.

#3: A doctor at a hospital in southwestern Pakistan says 10 people were killed when a bomb went off near a passenger bus in the city of Quetta. He says the hospital is also treating 37 people who were wounded in Friday's bombing. He says four of the wounded are in critical condition. Senior police officer Omar Cheema says the bomb was planted in a rickshaw and exploded when the bus drove by.

#4: At least 26 Taliban militants were killed and 17 others were injured following military operations conducted by Afghan national security forces in various provinces of Afghanistan. The operations were conducted during the past 24 hours in Kunar, Nangarhar, Samangan, Faryab, Sar-e-Pul, Zabul, Uruzgan, Maidan Wardak, Logar, Ghazni, Paktika and Helmand provinces of Afghanistan.

#5: A member of the Afghan national police (ANP) shot dead two members of the Afghan local police (ALP) in southern Helmand province of Afghanistan on Thursday. The incident took place in Marjah district of Helmand province around 11 am local time, local government officials said.

War News for Thursday, March 13, 2014

Reported security incidents
#1: A would-be-suicide bomber was shot dead close to the Indian consulate building in Afghanistan's Kandahar city Thursday, the police said. "A man wearing an explosives-laden jacket tried to approach the consulate gateway. The Afghan National Police identified the terrorist and fired at him after he ignored the police warning," Kandahar's provincial police spokesman Zia Durrani told Xinhua.

#2: The Afghan National Security Forces have conducted a series of operations across the country in which 26 Taliban militants have been killed, 17 wounded and 11 arrested, Afghanistan's Ministry of Interior Affairs has said.

#3: At least six militants were killed and eleven other wounded during a clash erupted between the forces loyal to the Afghan government and the armed rebels in eastern Nangarhar province, an official said Wednesday. Police chief, Fazl Ahmad Shirzad told Wakht News Agency that the forces stepped up to a counterattack from the Taliban who used heavy and small arms to target their outposts in the restive border Chaparhar district.

#4: A source from the provincial election commission (IEC) said Thursday that five of the commission members along with two vehicles were held by the insurgents in eastern Nangarhar province, an official said.

War News for Wednesday, March 12, 2014

Canada wraps up 12-year military mission in Afghanistan


Reported security incidents
#1: Afghan police officials say three insurgents tried to storm the former intelligence service headquarters in the southern city of Kandahar, prompting a fierce gun battle with security forces that left the attackers dead. Deputy police chief Rahmatullah Atrafi says the three men assaulted the former headquarters in the heart of the city early on Wednesday.

#3: Two people were killed on Wednesday in gunfire in Bannu, a private news channel reported. One of the two victims was a personnel of Frontier Corps (FC). According to police, the two victims, who were brothers, were attacked by unidentified men in the area of Hoyad Police Station in Janikhel.

#3: At least three polio vaccinators were killed following an improvised explosive device (IED) explosion in southern Helmand province of Afghanistan. According to local government officials, the incident took place Tuesday at midday near Sangin district after their vehicle struck with the improvised explosive device (IED).

War News for Tuesday, March 11, 2014

Reported security incidents
#1: A gunman shot dead a Swedish journalist outside a restaurant in a brazen attack in one Kabul's most heavily guarded districts on Tuesday, police and embassy sources said, underscoring growing insecurity threatening next month's elections. The Swedish Embassy identified the victim as Nils Horner, 51, who worked for Swedish Radio and had dual British-Swedish nationality.

#2: Three Taliban militants were killed while five others arrested in military operations, said the Afghan Interior Ministry on Tuesday. "Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) carried out several cleanup operations in several provinces within the past 24 hours, killing three Taliban members and detaining five other militants," the ministry said in a statement providing daily operational updates.

#3: Two policemen guarding a polio vaccination team in northwest Pakistan were were shot dead by armed men on Tuesday, police said, the latest setback to efforts to eradicate the crippling disease. Tuesday’s attack took place in the village of Gandi Umar Khan, about 20 kilometers (12 miles) west of the nearest city of Dera Ismail Khan, on the second day of an innoculation drive, senior police official Sadiq Baluch told AFP.

#4: A local leader of Ahl-e-Sunnat Wal-Jamaat, (ASWJ) was killed around midnight in a drive-by shooting near Zia Masjid located in an area between Rawalpindi and Islamabad. According to details, the unidentified miscreants sprayed bullets on the car of ASWJ Rawalpindi President Mufti Tanvir Alam; however, he was not on board his car. Instead, another ASWJ local leader Sohail Muawiya lost his life on the spot during the armed assault. According to Shehzad Town police, the gun attack also wounded two other people riding the car—Amanullah and Nasir. A stray bullet killed a passer-by, too.

War News for Monday, March 10, 2014

Taliban threaten to attack Afghan presidential elections

IDSA: Why Pakistan cannot defeat the Taliban


Reported security incidents
#1: Two policemen were killed and seven civilians wounded in a bomb attack Monday in western Afghanistan's Herat province, police said. The militants detonated an explosives-packed motorcycle in Kushk district around midday, killing two policemen and injuring seven civilians, including a child," provincial police chief Samiullah Qatra told Xinhua.

#2: Three dacoits were killed in an alleged encounter in the Johar Town area of Lahore earlier today. According to the Police, they signaled three suspects riding a motorbike to stop near the Johar Town Commercial Market. The suspects opened fire at the police. The police retaliated and killed all three of them.

#3: Six mortars were fired from Afghanistan hit bordering village of Miran Shah, North Waziristan on Sunday; however, fortunately did not result in any causality. According to sources, the Afghan forces fired six mortars in the suburb areas of Miranshah, one mortar fell in the open air and resulted in a blast while preventing from any causality. Earlier, 25 mortars were fired into Pakistan's tribal area from the Afghan side which resulted in partially damaging the nearby houses.

#4: A bomb blast ripped through a market in Spin Boldak town of the southern Kandahar province, a former stronghold of Taliban, on Sunday killing two persons and wounding another, the police spokesman in the province, Zia Durani, said. "The blast occurred in a scrap market in Spin Boldak town at 01: 10 p.m. local time today, leaving two persons including a father and his son dead and injuring another," Durani told Xinhua.
#5: At least 5 Taliban militants were killed and 6 others were injured following military operations by Afghan national security forces.

News of the Day for Sunday, March 9, 2014

Seven civilians are killed and 8 injured in an IED explosion in Musa Qala, Helmand province. AP also reports 2 civilians killed in a bombing in Kajaki district, and a police officer killed in an attack on a checkpoint in the same area.

Vice President Marshal Mohammad Qasim Fahim dies at age 56.

Four Afghan soldiers and 2 police officers killed while trying to defuse a bomb in Laghman province  on Saturday.

Taliban kill 3 teachers and abduct 1 in Ghor province. They were returning from a seminar in the provincial capital.

Canadian forces are packing up to leave Afghanistan. Canada at one time had 2,000 troops in the country, including artillery, armored forces, and helicopters. The country's remaining 100 will leave next week. The contingent will vacation in Cyprus before returning home. In 13 years, 158 Canadian soldiers died in Afghanistan.

War News for Saturday, March 08, 2014

Reported security incidents
#1: A bomb blast in Jalalabad city in Afghanistan on Saturday killed a district governor and injured five others, a local official said. “The bomb was planted inside the vehicle of Noor Agha Kamran, the Governor of Nazian district, and the device exploded around 9 a.m. killing the district governor and injuring one policeman and four civilians,” a public relations officer at the provincial government office added.

#2: At least 26 Taliban militants were killed or injured following military operations by Afghan national security forces in various provinces of the country.