India-Pakistan: Terrorists Caught Using Chinese UAV

Terrorists Caught Using Chinese UAV

September 16, 2005: Pakistan has a list of 173 clergymen, wanted for supporting terrorist activity. Pakistan has lost patience with religious leaders who support terrorism, and is cracking down.

September 14, 2005: In Pakistan, troops raided an al Qaeda base, a religious school, arresting 28 terrorist suspects, most of them foreigners. Weapons, bombs and other equipment were seized, including a small Chinese UAV. That was unusual, and the terrorists were apparently using the UAV to scout routes for infiltrating people across the nearby Afghan border, and to spot troops or police operating near their base. That didn't work, as the UAV was on the ground when the troops swooped in. The army had been tipped off by a local tribesman. The base was also used by the Taliban, to recruit local men for raids across the border in Afghanistan.

Meanwhile, in Quetta, a Pakistani city near the Afghan border, a Shia Moslem was shot dead by a Sunni radical. Sunnis and Shia radicals have been fighting each other in Pakistan for decades. This was the fifth such murder in the last few months, which indicates a change in terror tactics. Previously, both sides preferred mass murder attacks. However, such attacks are not completely gone. Recently, a bomb went off in a Sunni religious school, killing the man carrying it, and injuring two others. The bomb apparently went off at the wrong time, and it's still unclear if the bomber was attacking the school, or just passing through. Such religious schools are often at the center of religious violence.

In Kashmir, Indian troops killed three terrorists trying to cross the border from Pakistan.

September 13, 2005: In the last few days, army operations in India's northeast, killed at least 13 tribal separatists belonging to ULFA ( United Liberation Front of Assam). This group has been fighting since 1979.