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The thick brown sack that a man named Abdulmalek carried over his shoulder on a recent afternoon might have contained anything: weapons, drugs or explosives. But crossing back and forth between Afghanistan and Pakistan was no problem, he said. Afghan border guards never search him, even though he passes through this bustling crossing four or five times a week. ''What searching?'' said Mr. Abdulmalek, a 34-year-old clothing store owner who like many Afghans has only one name. ''There is no searching.'' [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The five American Muslim men from the Washington, D.C., area arrested last month in Pakistan on suspicion of plotting terrorist acts said at a court appearance on Monday that they were being tortured in custody. The five men appeared in a special antiterrorism court in the northeastern city of Sargodha, where the police detailed evidence and allegations against them. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

At least 10 people were killed in an American drone strike in northwest Pakistan on Thursday morning that was aimed at the leader of the Pakistani Taliban, according to Pakistani security officials. After the attack, several Pakistani security officials said there was no word on the whereabouts or condition of the Pakistani Taliban leader, Hakimullah Mehsud, who claimed responsibility for a suicide attack that killed eight people at a C.I.A. base in southeastern Afghanistan last month. But a Taliban spokesman said Mr. Mehsud was not among the casualties. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Taliban militants underscored their determination on Friday to prevent Pakistani citizens from forming armed militias to keep them at bay, as a suicide bomber rammed a truck loaded with hundreds of pounds of explosives into families and children crowded on a playground in the northwest. Local authorities said they had little doubt that the village, Shah Hassan Khel, was chosen because residents were forming a pro-government militia. The village sits at the edge of the tribal area of South Waziristan, where the military opened an offensive to break up Taliban strongholds in October. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The United Nations is moving as many as 60 foreign employees, or about one-quarter of its international staff, out of Pakistan for at least six months over safety concerns, a United Nations official said Thursday. The decision, which does not apply to the organization's 2,700 Pakistani employees, will be re-evaluated in three months, according to the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity in the absence of authorization to discuss the relocation. Improvements in the country's security could shorten the relocation. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The death toll from a suicide bomber's attack on a Shiite religious procession in Karachi was reported to have risen to 40 on Tuesday, as the city reeled from rioting overnight amid fears that extremist groups already waging a multifront war against the government were now trying to foment sectarian violence against the country's minority Shiite Muslims. The GEO television network, citing hospital sources, said at least 40 people had been killed and more than 100 had been injured in the attack, which struck the procession as it made its way along Muhammad Ali Jinnah Road on Monday afternoon. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A suicide bomber killed more than 30 people at a Shiite religious procession in Karachi on Monday, setting off rioting in parts of the city and prompting fears that extremist groups already waging a multifront war against the government were now trying to foment sectarian violence against the country's minority Shiite Muslims. The attack, the third against Shiites in three days, appeared to deeply unsettle the Pakistani government, which ordered the director general of the Rangers, a paramilitary force under the control of the Interior Ministry, to take control of Karachi. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A handful of deadly attacks ravaged parts of Pakistan this weekend and highlighted the multiple security challenges confronting the embattled Islamabad government, from violent vendettas by Taliban militants to sectarian violence against minority Shiites. The bloodiest attack happened Sunday in Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistani-controlled Kashmir in the north of the country, where a suicide bomber killed at least 10 people and wounded more than 80 during a Shiite religious procession. The attack could have been worse, the local authorities said: the bomber had been trying to enter a prayer hall but blew himself up when guards blocked him. Pakistani troops were rushed in to restore order. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A judge in Sargodha on Friday ordered that five Muslim Americans suspected of pursuing jihadist training in Pakistan remain in custody for another 10 days so the police could continue their investigation. An earlier custody order was set to expire Friday. The police said in mid-December that they were planning to charge the five men, all from the Washington, D.C., area, under antiterrorism laws with planning a ''criminal conspiracy''; they reiterated those intentions on Friday. No charges have been filed, and the men are due back in court on Jan. 4. If charged and convicted, they could serve prison sentences in Pakistan, but the law minister in Punjab Province, Rana Sanaullah, said he believed that the five men would ultimately be deported to the United States. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article was reported bySabrina Tavernise, Richard A. Oppel Jr.and Eric Schmittand written by Ms. Tavernise. Taliban insurgents are teaming up with local militant groups to make inroads in Punjab, the province that is home to more than half of Pakistanis, reinvigorating an alliance that Pakistani and American authorities say poses a serious risk to the stability of the country. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Pakistani authorities have obtained confessions from members of the Pakistani militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba that they were involved in the terrorist attacks in Mumbai in November that killed more than 160 people, a Pakistani official said. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This frontier city boasts a major air base and Pakistani Army and paramilitary garrisons. But the 200 Taliban guerrillas were in no rush as they methodically ransacked depots with NATO supplies here two weeks ago. The militants began by blocking off a long stretch of the main road, giving them plenty of time to burn everything inside, said one guard, Haroon Khan, who was standing next to a row of charred trucks. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A Sunni Muslim extremist group believed to have been involved in the 2002 abduction and murder of the journalist Daniel Pearl helped carry out the Marriott Hotel bombing in Islamabad three months ago that killed more than 50 people, according to a top Pakistani official. The official, Rehman Malik, the government's senior interior adviser, said that the group, Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, which was banned by Pakistan in 2001 and classified by the State Department as a foreign terrorist organization, helped organize the Sept. 20 bombing, which deeply shook the confidence of Pakistanis by demonstrating that extremists could perpetrate large-scale attacks close to the seat of power in Islamabad, the capital. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The police in Indian-administered Kashmir announced Tuesday the arrests of three suspected suicide bombers who they said were Pakistanis using fake Indian identity cards. The men were found at a hotel in Jammu, the winter capital of Kashmir State. The police declined to say how they were informed. Kuldeep Khoda, the state director general of police, told reporters in Jammu that the suspects were members of the banned Jaish-e-Muhammad organization, based in Pakistan. The Indian police described one of the men as a Pakistani soldier. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

India on Monday gave Pakistan what it called proof of Pakistani involvement in last month's terrorist attacks in Mumbai. The move built public pressure on India's neighbor, where the senior-ranking member of the American military arrived for talks for the second time since the attacks. The Indian Foreign Ministry announced late Monday that it had given Pakistani officials here what it described as a letter from the lone surviving attacker. In the letter, the Indian ministry said, the gunman, Muhammad Ajmal Kasab, said he and his nine accomplices were ''from Pakistan.'' India did not make the specific contents of the letter public. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Prime Minister Gordon Brown of Britain shuttled from India to Pakistan on Sunday to try to tamp down tensions between the two countries, but at the same time bluntly demanded that Pakistan do more to curb terrorism. Three-fourths of serious terrorist plots investigated in Britain have links to Al Qaeda in Pakistan, Mr. Brown said at a news conference with Pakistan's president, Asif Ali Zardari, in Islamabad. ''The time has come for action, and not words'' from Pakistan, he said. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Indian warplanes crossed into Pakistani airspace on Saturday over two parts of the country where the militant group accused of carrying out the Mumbai terror attacks is active, according to Pakistani officials, who said they scrambled their own air force jets to chase the Indian aircraft back across the border. The incursions would appear to be an aggressive display by India, whose top officials describe neighboring Pakistan as the ''epicenter of terrorism'' and say Pakistan's own intelligence service has long aided Lashkar-e-Taiba, the group blamed for the attacks in Mumbai last month, which sharply raised tensions between the nuclear-armed rivals. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

On a normal Friday afternoon the line of cars and red Honda motorbikes outside the Qadssiya mosque stretches to a gas station a half mile away. Eight thousand worshipers typically come to hear Hafiz Muhammad Saeed preach at the headquarters of the organization he leads, Jamaat-ud-Dawa, the charity that fronts for the militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba. The two-tiered mosque can accommodate only a portion of the crowd, so the remainder spill out onto a broad concrete courtyard. But this Friday the road outside was clear, and the few thousand who showed up were all able to fit inside. The day before, the Pakistani authorities had put Mr. Saeed under house arrest and closed dozens of the group's offices across the country. Many followers were unnerved. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

President Asif Ali Zardari has ceded his position in Pakistan's nuclear command structure to his prime minister, in a sudden political maneuver widely seen as a fresh sign of turmoil on the eve of President Obama's strategy announcement for the region. The move, announced in a news release late Friday night, was an all-out attempt to head off domestic political pressure as Mr. Zardari's two-year presidency hit a new low. With the end of a political amnesty program on Saturday, Mr. Zardari and his allies now face potential corruption and criminal charges, and the opposition is demanding that he relinquish many of his powers or resign. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]