• Red Cross halts most Pakistan aid in wake of doctor's beheading

    Banaras Khan / AFP - Getty Images, file

    Pakistani volunteers carry the coffin of British aid worker Khalil Dale, before handing it over to Red Cross officials in Quetta on April 30.

    By Mushtaq Yusufzai, NBC News

    PESHAWAR, Pakistan -- The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said late Tuesday it was halting most aid programs in Pakistan due to fears over deteriorating security – a concern underscored early Wednesday when 19 soldiers and militants were killed in a clash at a military checkpoint.

    The independent global aid agency, which rarely suspends its operations even in war zones, has worked in the country since the end of British colonial rule in 1947 - but was shaken by the discovery in April of the beheaded body of British doctor Khalil Rasjed Dale, one of its health workers.

    It said it would carry on working in the country "but on a reduced scale," having already suspended operations in three of Pakistan's four provinces in May pending a security assessment.

    As attacks increase, aid workers say they must keep safety in mind at all times.   NBC's Amna Nawaz reports.

    Paul Castella, head of the ICRC delegation in Islamabad, said in a statement: "We are ready to continue helping people in need, such as the wounded and the physically disabled, provided working conditions for our staff are adequate. In the coming weeks, we will coordinate with the Pakistani authorities the resumption of health services as conditions permit, in particular the re-opening of our surgical hospital in Peshawar, which closed down after the murder of our colleague."

    Aid workers become targets as Pakistan faces new humanitarian crisis

    The statement said the ICRC's partnership with the Pakistan Red Crescent Society and support for physical rehabilitation services, notably in Peshawar and Muzaffarabad, will continue, as will the assistance provided by the ICRC for families seeking to restore and maintain contact with Pakistanis detained abroad.


    The killing of an ICRC official in Quetta had seriously worried staff members of the organization about their security in Pakistan, particularly in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan. Dale, who converted to Islam, ran a health program in Quetta when he was kidnapped on January 5 while going home from work.

    Slideshow: Pakistan: A nation in turmoil

    Muhammed Muheisen / AP

    Images of daily life, political pursuits, religious rites and deadly violence.

    Launch slideshow

    His body was found on April 29 with a note that said the ICRC’s failure to pay ransom was the reason for his killing.

    Red Cross doctor found beheaded in Pakistan

    Dale was the third foreigner beheaded in Pakistan, after Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in 2002 and Polish geologist Piotr Stanczak in 2009.

    The Pakistan Taliban have been fighting a bloody insurgency against the Pakistani state since the group was formed 2007, Reuters reported. It is close to al-Qaida and it claimed credit for a failed car bomb attempt in New York's Times Square in May 2010. 

    Ex-ambassador: US, Pakistan should 'divorce'

    Meanwhile at least 19 people - nine Pakistan Army soldiers and 10 militants – were killed and 16 others injured in clashes between the Pakistani security forces and militants at the remote mountainous Ghatsar area of Tiarza, South Waziristan, on Wednesday.

    May 24: Pakistan and the U.S. are at odds over the treason conviction of the Pakistani doctor who helped the U.S. locate Osama Bin Laden. 

    Senior military officials said dozens of militants had attacked military checkpoints located in the mountains on Tuesday night that led to heavy fighting in the area.

    Pakistani Christians live in fear after girl's blasphemy arrest

    "The militants attacked our checkpoints with heavy weapons last night,” said a senior Pakistani military official based in Wana, the main administrative city of South Waziristan tribal region.

    “The soldiers retaliated and engaged the militants. Fighting is still going on in which nine soldiers lost their lives. The security forces had killed 10 militants and injured several others in the overnight clashes.”

    Rachel Maddow shares exclusive, never before seen footage of the site of an alleged U.S. drone strike in North Waziristan, and talks with Amna Nawaz, Islamabad bureau chief for NBC News about the plight of a Pakistani lawyer trying to give voice to victims of U.S. drone strikes.

    South Waziristan, which is one of Pakistan's seven autonomous tribal regions, is mostly controlled by Pakistani militants, Afghan Taliban and al-Qaeda operatives making it difficult for the government and its armed forces to carry out their responsibilities.

    Reuters contributed to this report.

     

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  • Red Cross desperate to deliver aid as Syria shells Homs again

    An aid convoy has been refused access to Baba Amr district of Homs, where residents have been without water for the last four days. Elsewhere in Syria, there have been anti-government protests following Friday prayers. Human rights campaigners claim that 13 people were killed when troops fired a mortar into a crowd of demonstrators in the town of Rastan. Britain's Channel Four News correspondent Carl Dinnen reports.

    By msnbc.com news services

    Armed forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar Assad on Saturday bombarded the Jobar residential neighborhood of Homs, where a standoff continued between a Red Cross convoy and the government that has blocked the delivery of food, medical supplies and blankets to the thousands still stranded in the area.

    Thousands of civilians from another area overrun by the army have taken refuge in the neighborhood, an opposition activist organization said.

    "In an act of pure revenge, Assad's army has been firing mortar rounds and ... machine guns since this morning at Jobar. We have no immediate reports of casualties because of the difficulty of communications," the Syrian Network for Human Rights said in statement.

    Jobar is adjacent to the district of Baba Amr in Homs, from where Free Syrian Army rebels pulled out this week after almost a month of army shelling. Activists reported mass executions by loyalist troops who subsequently entered the area.

    The Local Coordination Committees activist network said mortars slammed into Khaldiyeh, Bab Sbaa and Khader districts of the city early Saturday.

    Red Cross supplies arrived in the stricken Syrian city of Homs on Friday as evidence mounted of its humanitarian crisis after a month of bombardment from President Bashar Assad's forces. ITV's Paul Davies reports.

    Graphic: The siege of Homs

    Abu Hassan al-Homsi, a doctor at a makeshift clinic in Khaldiyeh district of Homs, said he treated a dozen wounded.

    "This has become routine, the mortars start falling early in the morning," he said. Several homes were damaged from the morning shelling, which he described as steady but intermittent. Most of those he treated were lightly wounded, al-Homsi added.

    Aid convoy blocked
    The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said Saturday it was still negotiating with Syrian authorities who have denied its aid convoy access to the shattered Baba Amr district.

    An ICRC convoy of seven trucks carrying food and other life-saving relief supplies, joined by Red Crescent ambulances to evacuate the sick and wounded, has been stalled in the city of Homs since arriving there on Friday.

    Red Cross convoy prevented from entering former Syrian rebel stronghold

    "The ICRC and Syrian Red Crescent are not yet in Baba Amr today (Saturday). We are still in negotiations with authorities in order to enter Baba Amro. It is important that we enter today," ICRC spokesman Hicham Hassan told Reuters in Geneva.

    ICRC President Jakob Kellenberger, in a statement issued on Friday after waiting all day for Syrian authorities to grant entry to the team, said the delay was "unacceptable" as civilians had waited for weeks for emergency assistance.

    U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said on Friday he had received "grisly reports" Syrian government forces were arbitrarily executing, imprisoning and torturing people in the battle-scarred city of Homs after rebel fighters had fled.

    PhotoBlog: The fear of carnage to come

    'Terrorist' suicide bombs
    Meanwhile, the Syrian state news agency Sana reported Saturday that a suicide bomber killed two people and wounded several others in the southern town of Deraa.

    "The terrorist explosion led to the martyrdom of two citizens," the agency said.

    The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights also reported that at least two people were killed and several others wounded in the explosion.

    Syrians flee to northern Lebanon

    Syria has seen a string of suicide bombings, the last on Feb. 10, when twin suicide bombs struck security compounds in the government stronghold city of Aleppo, killing 28 people and bringing significant violence for the first time to the city.

    The capital Damascus, another stronghold of Assad's, has seen three suicide bombings in the past two months.

    The regime has touted the attacks as proof that it is being targeted by "terrorists." The opposition accuses forces loyal to the government of being behind the bombings to tarnish the uprising.

    Saturday's bombing in Deraa marked the first time a suicide bombing struck an opposition stronghold. Daraa is the birthplace of the nearly year-old uprising against Assad. The revolt has killed more than 7,500 people, according to most recent U.N. estimates.

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    Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.