Pakistan | featured news

The death toll climbed to more than 1,300 in Pakistan on Wednesday as the nation's military and emergency services struggled to cope with the flood waters that have washed across the landscape.

More rain soaked flood-ravaged Pakistan on Saturday and even heavier downpours were forecast for coming days, deepening a crisis in which hard-line Islamists have rushed to fill gaps in the government's patchy response.

Floodwaters that devastated Pakistan's mountainous northwest surged into the heartland Tuesday, submerging dozens of villages along bloated rivers whose torrents have killed at least 1,500 people and put 100,000 at risk of disease.

Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari warned that the international community was losing the war against the Taliban in Afghanistan, according to an interview published on Tuesday.

The government has had difficulties getting aid to the affected area, and at times receiving accurate information. On Sunday, officials reduced the number of dead to 730, saying that earlier reports on Sunday, reaching as high at 1,100, were not credible.

More than 800 people in Pakistan and dozens more in Afghanistan have been killed in floods that have lashed the region for days, officials said Saturday.

Five young American Muslims were convicted of plotting terrorist attacks and sentenced to 10 years in jail Thursday in a case that highlights concerns about Westerners traveling to Pakistan to link up with al-Qaida and other extremist groups...

Pakistan detained an American armed with a dagger, a pistol and night vision goggles for allegedly trying to sneak into Afghanistan to hunt and kill al Qaeda head Osama bin Laden, police said on Tuesday.

Indian police are holding a pigeon under armed guard after it was caught on an alleged spy mission for neighboring Pakistan, media reported Friday.

The death of Sheik Said Masri, the terrorist network's operations chief and a relative of Osama bin Laden, would be a blow to Al Qaeda. U.S. officials say he was targeted in a drone strike.

Al Qaeda's third-ranking leader — a close associate and relative by marriage to Osama bin Laden — is believed to have been killed in a U.S. drone strike in Pakistan's tribal region, U.S.