A bomb blast at a Shiite mosque in southern Pakistan has killed at least 40 people and wounded dozens more, officials said, in the deadliest sectarian attack to hit the country in more than a year.

The bomb exploded as worshippers attended Friday prayers in the town of Shikarpur in Sindh province, around 470 kilometres north of Karachi.

Pakistan has suffered a rising tide of sectarian violence in recent years, most of it perpetrated by hardline Sunni Muslim groups against minority Shiite Muslims, who make up around one in five of the population.
Earlier, a spokesman for Sindh police said “at least 15 people have been killed and 40 others wounded”.

Shaukat Ali Memon, the medical superintendent of Civil Hospital in Shikarpur gave a death toll of 20, but there was no confirmation of the higher figure.

Witness Zahid Noon said hundreds of people had rushed to the scene to try to dig out survivors trapped under the roof of the mosque, which collapsed in the blast.

Television footage of the aftermath showed chaotic rescue scenes as people piled the wounded into cars, motorbikes and rickshaws to take them for treatment.

“The area is scattered with blood and flesh and it smells of burnt meat, people are screaming at each other… it is chaos,” Mr Noon said.

“A huge contingency of police and rangers is present here and ambulances from the nearby towns have started to arrive.”

Abdul Quddus, a senior police official in Shikarpur, said the initial investigation suggested it may have been a suicide blast.

Increasing attacks on Shiite targets

It is the bloodiest single sectarian attack in Pakistan since January 22 last year, when 24 Shiite pilgrims returning from Iran were killed when their bus was bombed in southwestern Baluchistan province.

Friday’s attack came as prime minister Nawaz Sharif visited Karachi, the capital of Sindh province, to discuss the law and order situation in the city.

Karachi, Pakistan’s biggest city and economic heartbeat, has wrestled for several years with a bloody wave of criminal, sectarian and politician murders.

Anti-Shiite attacks have been increasing in recent years in Karachi and also in the southwestern city of Quetta, the northwestern area of Parachinar and the far northeastern town of Gilgit.

Around 1,000 Shiites have been killed in the past two years in Pakistan, a heavy toll, with many of the attacks claimed by the hardline Sunni group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ).

Pakistan has stepped up its fight against militants in the past month, following a Taliban massacre at a school in the northwestern city of Peshawar.

Heavily armed gunmen went from room to room at the army-run school murdering 150 people, most of them children, in an attack that horrified the world.

Since then the government has ended a six-year moratorium on executions in terror-related cases and pledged to crack down on all militant groups.

Fighting between the Syrian arm of al Qaeda and Western-backed rebels in northern Syria spread from Aleppo province into neighbouring Idlib on Friday, the rebel group and an organization monitoring the civil war said.

Clashes began on Thursday when the al Qaeda Syria wing, the Nusra Front, seized positions from the Hazzm movement west of Aleppo, threatening one of the few remaining pockets of the non-jihadist insurgency.

A Hazzm official said by telephone clashes had spread to Idlib and that his group had retaken some areas previously controlled by Nusra.

“There is now fighting in Idlib, in the Jabal al-Zawiya area,” he said. He said in Aleppo province, the two groups were also fighting in Atarib, a town 20 km (12 miles) from the Turkish border.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said heavy fighting overnight focused on the Regiment 46 base in western Aleppo and overlapping areas between Aleppo and Idlib province, where the Nusra Front pushed out rebels from many areas in October.

The Observatory, which monitors the war, said Hazzm had captured some small checkpoints in Idlib.

Hazzm is one of the last remnants of non-jihadist opposition to President Bashar al-Assad in northern Syria, much of which has been seized by the Nusra Front and Islamic State, an offshoot of al Qaeda that controls roughly a third of Syria.

The Nusra Front said on Friday it was forced to act after Hazzm detained two of its fighters and captured its weapons and offices.

“It’s probably most accurate to view this as the latest instance of Nusra efforts to expand their areas of dominance in Idlib and Aleppo at the expense of Western-backed factions, which they are gradually seeking to eliminate from the north,” said Noah Bonsey, senior analyst on Syria with International Crisis Group.

Both Hazzm — part of the Free Syria Army collection of mainstream rebel groups — and Nusra fight the government. The Observatory said Nusra and other Islamist militants also fought the Syrian army in western Idlib on Friday.

Hazzm has received what it describes as small amounts of military aid from foreign states opposed to Assad, including U.S.-made anti-tank missiles. But it has lost ground to better armed and financed jihadists.

The weakness of the mainstream Syrian opposition has complicated diplomatic efforts to end the conflict that has killed around 200,000 people.

Source:  in.news.yahoo

The Taliban militants group in Afghanistan claimed responsibility behind an insider attack in kabul airport which left at least three coalition contractors dead.

The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) group’s Egypt wing claimed a series of attacks that killed at least 27 security personnel on Thursday in some of the worst anti-government violence in months, after commemorations around the anniversary of the 2011 uprising turned deadly in the past week.

Egypt is fighting an Islamist insurgency based in the Sinai. Hundreds of security force members have been killed since the army ousted President Mohammed Mursi of the Muslim Brotherhood in July 2013 after mass protests against his rule.

The government makes no distinction between the Brotherhood and the Sinai-based militants. The Brotherhood denies any links to the insurgents.

The most active militant group in Sinai, Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, changed its name to Sinai Province last year when it swore allegiance to ISIS, the hardline militant group that has seized swathes of Iraq and Syria.

A series of tweets from the Sinai Province’s Twitter account claimed responsibility for each of the four attacks that took place in North Sinai province within hours of one another on Thursday night.

Thursday’s first attack was a bombing targeting a military headquarters, base and hotel in the capital of North Sinai province that killed 25 and wounded at least 58, including nine civilians, security and medical sources said.

The flagship government newspaper, al-Ahram, said its office in the city of al-Arish, which is situated opposite the military buildings, had been “completely destroyed,” although it was not clear if it had been a target.

Later, suspected militants killed an army major and wounded six others at a checkpoint in Rafah, while an assault on a checkpoint south of al-Arish wounded four soldiers, security sources said. A roadside bomb in Suez city, not in the Sinai, that killed a police officer was not claimed by ISIS.

After Sinai Province’s claim of responsibility, security sources said a suspected militant had been killed while attempting to plant a bomb at a power transformer in Port Said.

Sinai-based militants have killed hundreds of security officers since Mursi was removed from power following mass protests against his rule.

The military said in a statement on its Facebook page that the attacks were the result of a successful campaign to pressure the militants.

Meanwhile, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi cut short a visit to the Ethiopian capital for an African Union summit, following the wave of deadly attacks.

Sisi’s office said in a statement emailed on Friday morning that Sisi was heading back to Cairo to follow the situation.

Sisi had been scheduled to address the AU summit that began in Addis Ababa on Friday morning.

The US State Department condemned the attack, saying in a statement: “The United States remains steadfast in its support of the Egyptian government’s efforts to combat the threat of terrorism in Egypt as part of our continuing commitment to the strategic partnership between our two countries.”

Fragile recovery
The violence and civil unrest comes as Egypt is trying to burnish its image in the run-up to an investor’s summit in mid-March, to be followed by parliamentary elections.

The attacks in al-Arish and Rafah continue a pattern of unrest in the remote but strategic Sinai Peninsula, which borders the Gaza Strip, the Israeli-occupied territories and Egypt’s Suez Canal.

But the less common attempts in Port Said and Suez, at opposite ends of the Canal, bring the insurgency nearer to a key source of hard currency for the cash-strapped state.

Income from the canal has not been hurt by the turmoil following the 2011 uprising to the same extent as foreign investment and tourism, and a planned second canal is meant to boost the waterway’s value to Egypt.
However, Egypt’s attempts to attract investors for mega-projects, such as the second canal, that the government says are key to securing a nascent recovery could stall if instability increases.

The last major attacks in Egypt were on October 24, when militants killed at least 33 members of the security forces. That operation was also claimed by Sinai Province.

That prompted the government to declare a state of emergency in parts of Sinai, allow civilians to be tried in military courts, and close the only border not under Israeli control with Gaza.

Egyptian authorities have also decided to completely demolish the city of Rafah, in a bid to create a buffer zone between Egypt and Gaza.

Earlier in January, the authorities have officially began the second stage of evacuation of Rafah houses.
According to North Sinai district Governor Abdul Fattah Harhour, “it would be necessary to completely remove the city of Rafah in order to create a buffer zone on the borders with Gaza,” adding that the authorities began evacuating 1,220 homes, housing over 2,044 families, in the area demarcated for the establishment of the zone.

The displaced families will receive compensation for the values of their lost homes, but not for the lands upon which the homes were built.

In the first phase, more than 800 homes are being demolished and 1,100 families displaced to build the 500-meter wide, 13.5-kilometer long buffer zone.

Harhour said military engineering units in the area of Abu Shnar have started working on establishing a “new Rafah city,” with residential zones appropriate to the nature and traditions of the residents of Rafah.

The main part of the plan, aimed at blocking the southern borders with Gaza, is being implemented under the pretext of stemming jihadists reportedly infiltrating Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula from across the border through the Rafah crossing – Gaza’s only outlet to the outside world not under Israeli control.

Protest deaths
Tensions have risen across Egypt in the past week with protests, some of them violent, marking four years since the uprising that ousted dictator Hosni Mubarak from power.

Earlier on Thursday, a group of women protested in Cairo over the death of activist Shaimaa Sabbagh and around 25 others said to have been killed by security forces at rallies commemorating the 2011 uprising.

Sabbagh, 32, died on Saturday as riot police were breaking up a small, peaceful demonstration. Friends said she had been shot, and images of her bleeding body rippled out across social media, sparking outrage and condemnation.

“The Interior Ministry are thugs!” chanted about 100 female protesters at the site of Sabbagh’s death. Some held up signs with the word “murderer” scrawled over the face of Interior Minister Mohammed Ibrahim.

The protesters were defying a law that severely restricts protests. “People are here at incredible risk to themselves. But it’s a way of standing against the fear they have instilled,” said activist Yasmin el-Rifae.

Ibrahim has said an investigation into Sabbagh’s death will lead to prosecution if any member of the security forces is found responsible.

One of the organizers of Thursday’s demonstration said they had asked only women to attend because they feared infiltration by plainclothes male agents.

Across the street from the protesters, beside police officers, men stood making lewd gestures and yelling profanities. Others chanted in favor of Sisi.

Criticism is growing of the security tactics Sisi has used since Mursi was ousted.

A crackdown that began with the deaths of hundreds of Brotherhood supporters and the imprisonment of thousands more has expanded to include liberals and other activists.

Some of those now opposed to the government initially supported the protests that led to Mursi’s removal and Sisi’s rise to power, as people who knew Sabbagh said she had.

Moreover, scores of activists who revolted against Mubarak are being held in prison for holding unauthorized protests, while the April 6 Youth Movement that spearheaded the revolt has been banned by a court.

The revolt against Mubarak erupted on January 25, 2011, with hundreds of thousands of protesters taking to the streets across Egypt for 18 days until he stepped down.

The anti-Mubarak revolt was fueled by the police abuses and corruption that marked the strongman’s three-decade rule, but the police has since regained popularity amid widespread yearning for stability.

After his ouster Mubarak was detained and put on trial along with his security chiefs on charges of involvement in the deaths of protesters during the revolt.

Most of the charges have been dropped, bringing Mubarak closer to freedom. On the fourth anniversary of the January 25 revolt, his two sons Alaa and Gamal Mubarak walked out of prison pending a separate corruption retrial with their father.

“The Egyptian judiciary has shown a double-standard for justice by exonerating state officials from any guilt in committing human rights violations on the one hand; and on the other, by issuing hefty prison terms against those who exercise their civil and political rights,” the International Federation of Human Rights group said.

A lower court had jailed the Mubaraks in May 2014 for embezzling millions of dollars from state funds allocated for renovating presidential palaces.

But an appeals court overturned that verdict and ordered a retrial.

The military crackdown after Mursi’s ouster has killed more than 1,400 people, most of them within hours when police broke up two pro-Mursi camps in Cairo during the summer of 2013.

More than 15,000 Mursi supporters are also imprisoned, while dozens have been sentenced to death after speedy trials which the United Nations has denounced as “unprecedented in recent history.”

Sisi has repeatedly defended his regime, and soon after murder charges were dropped against Mubarak, he insisted that Egypt was “on a path to establish a modern democratic state based on justice, freedom, equality and renunciation of corruption.”

Source:  al-akhbar

Islamic State (Isis) supporters on social media are hailing dozens of IS militants who have allegedly infiltrated a Saudi Arabian border town via Iraq.

Saudi intelligence services are reportedly on the search for the IS militants after an anti-government Saudi Twitter user, known as ‘mujtahidd’, tweeted to his 1.2m followers that an attack was launched on border guards.

The Twitter user also claimed IS militants have reached the Saudi town of Rafha.

التفاصيل: هجوم على حرس الحدود من مجموعة قادمة من العراق مدعوم بهجوم خلية من الداخل أدى لهروب حرس الحدود ثم ذوبان المجموعتين في ضواحي رفحا
— مجتهد (@mujtahidd) January 27, 2015

Neither IS nor the Saudi officials have released an official confirmation on the border infiltration though comments were being exchanged back and forth on social media between IS supporters and Saudi citizens using hashtag #Rafha.

Social media was also abuzz with pictures of the alleged Saudi border checkpoint that was captured by IS militants.

Anti-radicalisation thinktank Quilliam Foundation’s researcher Charlie Winter said a “heavy campaign” seems to be brewing inside the Kingdom.

“You have people in Saudi Arabia saying ‘be careful with this, it’s just a rumour, it’s just the Islamic State trying to destabilise the Kingdom,'”said Winter.

“They will always exaggerate, but I have not seen something like this completely pulled out of the bag before.
“In the wake of King Abdullah’s death, it would make sense for IS to try and destabilise them in this way, whether it was an incursion or whether it was just by disseminating rumours to scare people.”

Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia is in the process of building a 600-mile-long ‘Great Wall’ along its northern border with Iraq to shield itself from IS.

Construction of the wall started in September last year with the Saudi-Iraq border now featuring five layers of fencing with watchtowers, night-vision cameras, and radar.

On the other side of the wall lies the predominant IS-occupied Iraq territory.

IS has said that their ultimate victory will be conquering Muslim holy cities, Mecca and Medina, in Saudi Arabia.

Source:  ibtimes

The African Union has called for a regional five-nation force of 7,500 troops to defeat the “horrendous” rise of the Nigerian armed group Boko Haram, AU Commission Chief Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma has said.

The statement on Friday came after Boko Haram increased cross border raids in recent weeks, in neighbouring countries such as Cameroon and Chad, as it continued to take over more territory in Nigeria.

“Boko Haram’s horrendous abuses, unspeakable cruelty, total disregard for human lives, and wanton destruction of property are unmatched,” Dlamini-Zuma said in a statement after the bloc’s Peace and Security Council met late Thursday, ahead of a full AU summit meeting on Friday.

The Boko Haram uprising has become a regional crisis, with the four directly affected countries – Cameroon, Chad, Niger and Nigeria – agreeing along with Benin to boost cooperation to contain the threat and to form a Multinational Joint Task Force (MNJTF).

“I am deeply concerned by the prevailing situation as a result of Boko Haram terrorist activities, including the recent escalation of violence witnessed on the ground,” Dlamini-Zuma said after the meeting at AU headquarters in the Ethiopian capital, where the two-day annual summit of the 54-nation bloc is slated to be held.

“The continued attacks in northeastern Nigeria and the increasing attacks in the Lake Chad Basin, along the border with Chad and Cameroon, and in the northern provinces of that country, have the potential of destabilising the entire region, with far-reaching security and humanitarian consequences.”

More than 13,000 people have been killed and about one million made homeless by Boko Haram violence since 2009.

Regional nations pledged earlier this month to commit a battalion each to the force, a total of some 3,000 troops, but Dlamini-Zuma said after meetings

‘Continental problem’
Chad’s President Idriss Deby, who earlier this month sent a convoy of troops and 400 military vehicles into neighbouring Cameroon to fight Boko Haram, said action had to be taken.

“We have seen too many meetings and no concrete action,” Deby said.

“Today, there are four countries affected by Boko Haram, but tomorrow it may be a continental problem.”
Nigeria has the largest army in west Africa but has come under criticism at home and abroad for failing to stop the advance of Boko Haram.

Earlier this month Nigerian security officials ruled out the need for a United Nations or African Union-backed force to fight Boko Haram, saying the country and its partners could handle the threat.

But international pressure has ramped up, with a top US military commander General David Rodriguez, head of US Africa Command, warning this week that tackling Boko Haram will need a “huge” international effort.

Source: Al Jazeera