The death toll in a massive suicide blast in Pakistan’s militant-plagued north-west reached 35, officials said today, as the country prepared for the widower of assassinated ex-Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto to take over as president.

THE top-ranking cleric of a radical mosque besieged by government forces in Pakistan’s capital rejected calls for an unconditional surrender yesterday, saying he and his die-hard followers were ready for martyrdom.