The death toll from a Pakistani Taliban suicide attack on a Shiite Muslim procession rose from 43 to 65 overnight as critically wounded people died in hospitals, police said today.

Seven members of an al-Qaida-linked militant group were detained along with heroin, suicide vests and explosives, police in Pakistan said today.

THE luxury Marriott hotel in Islamabad reopened yesterday, just three months after it was destroyed in a suicide truck bombing that killed 60 people, the worst attack in Pakistan this year.

Three suicide bombers blew themselves up during a raid on their hide-out in southern Pakistan today.

Two suspected militants have been arrested in Pakistan over the 2002 kidnapping and murder of US journalist Daniel Pearl.

A senior figure in an outlawed Sunni Muslim militant group that has been linked to al-Qaida was among six men arrested last week in eastern Pakistan, a police official said today.

Police who raided a militant hideout said today they arrested the alleged mastermind of major sectarian attacks that killed more than 100 minority Shiite Muslims in south-western Pakistan.

Pakistani security officials said today they foiled new terror attacks with the arrest of the head of an al-Qaida linked extremist group accused of killing scores of minority Shiite Muslims.

POLICE in Pakistan said yesterday they were holding seven Islamic militants with possible links to the suspects in the London suicide bombings, as a probe into the suspected ties focused on the city of Lahore.

Police in Lahore today said they were holding some Islamic militants who may have had links with the suspects in the London suicide bombings, as investigators try to assess whether extremists in Pakistan were involved in the July 7 attacks.

Police in Pakistan have found a letter from the purported chief of a Sunni Muslim militant group claiming responsibility for this week’s bombing at a Shiite mosque and a shootout in Karachi that left five people dead.

Dozens of stone-throwing Muslim youths set fire to shops in the Pakistani city of Karachi today as sectarian unrest rumbled on despite a citywide shutdown called by a hardline Islamic alliance to protest against violence that has left 12 dead this week.

Authorities arrested al-Qaida’s No 3 commander and said today they were “on the right track” to catch bin Laden himself.

Two Islamic militants blew themselves up with bombs after an intense gun battle with police in the Pakistani city of Quetta today.

Thousands of minority Shiite Muslims rampaged through an eastern Pakistan city for a second day today, setting fire to a police station and the mayor’s office, after a mass funeral for victims of a suicide bombing at a mosque that killed 31 people.

Five suspected members of an outlawed Islamic militant group blamed for killing Shi’ite Muslims and attacks targeting Westerners and Christians in Pakistan have been arrested, police said today.

Community leaders today hailed one of the victims of a massacre at a local Shiite mosque as a hero, saying he barred the doors to the house of worship as gunmen closed in, saving many of those inside.

Gunmen opened fire inside a Shiite mosque in Karachi today, killing eight worshippers and injuring at least 10 others, police and hospital officials said.

PAKISTANI police said a leading Islamic militant suspected of involvement in the murder of US reporter Daniel Pearl may have blown himself up yesterday while making bombs in the southern port city of Karachi.

Pakistani authorities have arrested three men in connection with a May suicide bombing outside a hotel in the southern port city of Karachi that killed 14 people, including 11 French engineers, police said today.

Pakistani police are questioning seven men in connection with last week's car bombing at the US Consulate.