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Utah Gun Maker Turns Down $15M Deal With Pakistan

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Photo Credit: Thomas Cooper

Photo Credit: Thomas Cooper

A Utah-based gun manufacturer has turned down a $15 million deal to supply Pakistan with precision rifles, citing concerns they could eventually be used against U.S. troops.

Mike Davis, sales manager at Desert Tech, said the company was on a short list for a contract with Pakistan, but spurned the opportunity because of unrest in Pakistan and ethical concerns.

It was a difficult decision because of the amount of money involved, he said, and the sale of rifles to Pakistan would have been legal.

“We don’t know that those guns would’ve went somewhere bad, but with the unrest we just ended up not feeling right about it,” Davis told KTVX-TV.

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Saudi Arabia Said to Have Bought Nukes from Pakistan

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Photo Credit: Youtube/Al Jazeera EnglishSaudi Arabia may be prepared to field nuclear bombs it has purchased from Pakistan in response to Iran’s alleged military nuclear program, and may already have deployed missile systems capable of delivering the bombs, the BBC reported on Wednesday.

According to Mark Urban, diplomatic and defense editor for the BBC’s Newsnight, there are suggestions that the Saudis have paid for a number of nuclear weapons that are ready and waiting in Pakistan. If the reports are accurate, the kingdom could have atomic weapons on its missiles even before Iran has that capability.

Urban said it was an assessment shared by the former head of the IDF’s head of intelligence, Amos Yadlin, and cited comments Yadlin made to that effect at a conference in Sweden last month.

“The Saudis will not wait one month,” Yadlin reportedly said. “They already paid for the bomb, they will go to Pakistan and bring what they need to bring.”

Another source, described as “a senior NATO decision maker,” told Urban earlier this year of an intelligence report about Pakistani-made nuclear weapons ready for delivery to the kingdom.

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Pakistani PM Pleads with Obama to Put an End to Drone Strikes

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Photo Credit: Pablo Martinez Monsivais/APPakistani prime minister Nawaz Sharif added to growing international pressure over US drone killings on Wednesday by calling on Barack Obama to end all strikes in his country.

At the end of a long-awaited US trip designed to smooth growing tensions between the US and Pakistan, Sharif told reporters that he had “emphasised the need to end such strikes”, which are estimated to have killed between 2,525 and 3,613 people in Pakistan since 2004.

But a 2,500-word joint statement issued by the White House after the one-on-one meeting in Washington and attributed to the two leaders did not mention drone attacks, referring only to a need to respect “sovereignty and territorial integrity”.

It said President Obama also “conveyed appreciation for Pakistan’s internal and regional security challenges”. Both leaders refused to take questions at the end of their two-hour meeting in the Oval Office.

In prepared remarks, Obama acknowledged that there will “inevitably be some tensions … and some misunderstandings between our two countries” but insisted the US-Pakistan relationship will continue to be a “source of strength”.

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‘The Taliban Have Never Come for a Small Girl’: What Brave Pakistani Schoolgirl Malala Told Friend Before She was Shot in the Head (+video)

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Photo Credit: Getty Images Pakistani schoolgirl Malala Yousafzai told her friend not to worry because the Taliban ‘have never come for a small girl’, shortly before she was shot in the head by a militant.

The 16-year-old was gunned down last year on her school bus after angering the Taliban with her brave and outspoken pleas for girls to be educated.

In her autobiography, I am Malala, she describes the moment she was shot on her way home from school in the valley of Swat in north-west Pakistan on October 9, 2012.

Malala was travelling with about 20 other girls when a masked man approached their school bus and said: ‘Who is Malala?’

Although no one said a word, some girls looked at Malala and she as the only one with her face uncovered.

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How Did the Pakistan Earthquake Create a Mud Island?

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Photo Credit: Gwadar Government/AP

Photo Credit: Gwadar Government/AP

On Tuesday, a 7.7-magnitude earthquake struck a remote part of western Pakistan, killing more than 260 people and displacing hundreds of thousands. It also triggered formation of a new island off the coast, which has quickly become a global curiosity.

But scientists say the island won’t last long.

“It’s a transient feature,” said Bill Barnhart, a research geophysicist with the U.S. Geological Survey. “It will probably be gone within a couple of months. It’s just a big pile of mud that was on the seafloor that got pushed up.”

Indeed, such islands are formed by so-called mud volcanoes, which occur around the world, and Barnhart and other scientists suspect that’s what we’re seeing off the Pakistani coast.

News organizations have reported that the Pakistani island suddenly appeared near the port of Gwadar after the quake. The island is about 60 to 70 feet (18 to 21 meters) high, up to 300 feet (91 meters) wide, and up to 120 feet (37 meters) long, reports the AFP.

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7.7 Magnitude Quake in Pakistan Just Created a New Island

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Photo Credit: io9

Photo Credit: io9

A massive, 7.7 magnitude quake struck south-central Pakistan on Tuesday afternoon local time. The USGS warns that there will high casualties and economic losses, requiring international response. Seismologists have also confirmed that the quake raised a new island, about 30-40 feet high, off the coast.

The island is about half a mile off the coast of Gwadar, in the Arabian Sea. Already, reports the International Herald Tribune, crowds have gathered to see the mountainous, rocky island. Some are claiming it is 100 feet long.

t’s not unusual for earthquakes of this magnitude to change the coastline, or even deform the shape of the planet. In 2010, an 8.8 magnitude quake in Chile created new coastlines in that country and changed the shape of the Earth enough to shorten our days by a fraction of a second.

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Scores Are Killed by Suicide Bomb Attack at Historic Church in Pakistan

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Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

A suicide attack on a historic church in northwestern Pakistan killed at least 78 people on Sunday in one of the deadliest attacks on the Christian minority in Pakistan in years.

The attack occurred as worshipers left All Saints Church in the old quarter of the regional capital, Peshawar, after a service on Sunday morning. Up to 600 people had attended and were leaving to receive free food being distributed on the lawn outside when two explosions ripped through the crowd. “As soon as the service finished and the food was being distributed, all of a sudden we heard one explosion, followed by another,” said Azim Ghori, a witness.

Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, who arrived in Peshawar on Sunday evening, said that 78 people had been killed, including 34 women and 7 children. “Such an attack on women and children is against humanity,” he said.Akhtar Ali Shah, the home secretary of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province, said that more than 100 people had been wounded. Mr. Khan said that 37 of those were children.

The dead included two Muslim police officers who had been posted outside the church. Witnesses reported scenes of mayhem as rescue workers ferried victims from the church, which was scattered with body parts, shrapnel and bloodied clothing.

On Sunday afternoon, the bodies of 45 victims were placed in coffins and moved to the nearby St. John’s Church, the oldest church in the city. The coffins were placed in the church playground as dozens of grieving relatives and mourners gathered. A large contingent of police officers was deployed outside the church, and mourners were allowed to enter the compound after a thorough security check. Ambulances were allowed to enter the compound one by one as dead bodies were then placed in vehicles to take them to the morgue.

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Kerry Screws Up, Mistakenly Promises Pakistan to End Drone Strikes

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Photo Credit: Center for American Progress Action FundThe Obama administration was forced into damage control on Thursday as officials attempted to walk back Secretary of State John Kerry’s pledge to end armed drone operations in Pakistan.

During a diplomatic visit to Pakistan on Thursday, Kerry told Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif that Washington plans to severely curtail and eventually end armed drone operations in the country.

The move was geared toward an overall effort by the Obama administration to forge “a real partnership” between the White House and Islamabad, Kerry told reporters after his meeting with Sharif.

“I think the [drone] program will end as we have eliminated most of the threat and continue to eliminate it,” Kerry said in an interview with Pakistani television…

The Obama administration reacted quickly to Kerry’s comments, saying his statements did not reflect a coming change in the use of armed drones against terrorist targets or overall U.S. counterterrorism policy.

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Pakistani Taliban Prison Attack Frees Hundreds of Inmates

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Photo Credit: Saood Rehman/EPAHundreds of prisoners have been freed by Islamists in Pakistan after a spectacular assault by extremists on a jail in the western city of Dera Ismail Khan.

The attack, at around 11.30pm on Monday, involved one large bomb – so loud it rattled windows miles away – to blow a hole in the jail’s walls, followed by a mortar bombardment.

Around 70 gunmen, many dressed in police uniforms, then rushed through the gaps, throwing grenades and firing rocket-propelled grenades, killing six policemen and opening cells to free around 250 prisoners. Authorities said these included 24 wanted terrorists.

The attack, which came on the eve of voting for a new president in the troubled south Asian state, underlines once again the weakness of the Pakistani state and the inability of the country’s law and order agencies to maintain security.

One strike last week targeted an office of the main spy agency, the ISI, while another killed more than 50 Shia Muslims. Six Shia Muslim prisoners – the vast majority of Pakistanis are Sunni – were killed in Monday night’s assault.

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Gunmen Kill 9 Foreign Tourists in Northern Pakistan

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gunmenGunmen stormed a hotel in a remote part of northern Pakistan on Sunday and killed nine foreign tourists and a Pakistani guide, police and security officials said.

Five Ukrainians, three Chinese a Russian and their guide were killed in the attack in a remote resort area near the base camp for the snow-covered Nanga Parbat mountain, a popular destination for adventurous trekkers, officials said.

“Unknown people entered a hotel where foreign tourists were staying last night and opened fire,” Ali Sher, a senior police officer in Gilgit-Baltistan province, said.

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