A suicide blast outside the emergency ward of a hospital crowded with Shi'ite Muslim mourners in Pakistan's volatile northwest killed at least 27 people, including two police. The Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for the blast in Dera Ismail Khan, NWFP. A local Shi'ite leader shot earlier in the day had just died from his wounds when the blast went off. The attack, the latest in a wave of sectarian violence in the region, occurred a day after Pervez Musharraf stepped down as Pakistan's president. Maulvi Umar, spokesman for Pakistan's Taliban movement, claimed responsibility in an interview with the AP, but denied the mourners were the target, saying "This is not a sectarian attack."

Pakistani warplanes and helicopters bombed Lowi Sam and other areas of the Bajaur Tribal Agency near the Afghan border Aug. 10, forcing thousands of people to flee their homes. Witnesses said seven people were killed and dozens of houses were damaged in Lowi Sam and adjacent localities. The air-strikes were said to target homes being used by thelocal Taliban commander Faqir Mohammad. Taliban militants started moving towards Khar, the regional headquarters, where they have dug trenches and seized a section of the main highway. Nine soldiers have been killed over four days of fighting and over 100 militants, authorities said. (Dawn, Pakistan, Aug. 11)

At least 10 were killed in a battle between two rival groups in the Mohmand district of Pakistan's Mohmand Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) July 19. Hundreds of supporters of Baitullah Mehsud, leader of the Tehrik-e-Taliban—popularly known as the Pakistani Taliban—fought members of a breakaway faction of the group, local authorities said. A spokesman for Mehsud's group claimed his fighters had killed 15 members of the rival group and captured 120 others, including Shah Khalid, their senior commander.

The US military and NATO force in Afghanistan (ISAF) say the July 17 raid against "high-priority Taliban targets" in Herat province led to the deaths of two key insurgent tribal leaders—identified as Haji Nazrullah Khan and Haji Dawlat Khan—and a significant number of their followers. The US/ISAF statements denied claims of local tribal elders that dozens of civilians were killed in the air-strike in the Zirko valley of Shindan district.

With all eyes on the Tribal Areas, the insurgency in Pakistan's bordering Baluchistan province continues. A roadside bomb wounded seven security personnel and two passers-by in Mastung district July 15. (AP, July 15) On July 4, an eight-year-old beggar was killed when a bomb attached to a motorcycle exploded at a crowded market in Quetta, Baluchistan's capital. "The blast killed an eight-year-old girl and injured her beggar mother who were sitting near the motorcycle parked by some unknown man," a police official said. (AFP, July 4)

Barack Obama proposes the US deploy 10,000 more troops to Afghanistan to fight insurgents even as he pledges to remove troops from Iraq, plugging the proposal in a New York Times op-ed, "My Plan for Iraq." (NYT, July 14) Meanwhile, relations are fast deteriorating between Afghanistan and key US ally Pakistan. In an official statement calling Pakistan's security forces the "world's biggest producers of terrorism and extremism," Afghanistan announced it is suspending participation in three meetings with Pakistani officials scheduled for the next few weeks. Afghanistan charged Islamabad with "direct interference in its internal affairs." (Newsday, July 16)

An investigation by Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzai has confirmed reports that a US air strike in the Deh Bala district of Nangarhar province July 6 killed 47 members of a wedding party, including the bride. The investigation found that 39 of the dead were women and children. NATO still maintains the victims were insurgents. (The Independent, July 13) Karzai has also ordered an investigation into a July 4 helicopter strike in Nuristan in which the provincial governor said 22 civilians were killed and seven wounded. (NYT, July 7)

At least 20 were killed July 12 in fighting between Pakistani security forces and Taliban insurgents following an attack on an army convoy near Zargari, North-West Frontier Province. The violence came during an unannounced, one-day visit to Pakistan by Adm. Michael Mullen, the Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman. Mullen met with President Pervez Musharraf and army chief Gen. Ashfaq Kiyani. (WP, July 13) Foreign Minister Mahmoud Qureshi said he has ruled out allowing US military personnel to hunt for Osama bin Laden on Pakistan's territory. "People will not accept it," Qureshi said. "Questions of sovereignty come in." (AlJazeera, July 13)