Friday, 26 March 2004 - 11:16 PM EST

8 Hostages Executed in Pakistan Siege
By AMY WALDMAN

Published: March 27, 2004

SLAMABAD, Pakistan, Saturday, March 27 ? Eight Pakistani soldiers who had been taken hostage by militants in Pakistan's tribal areas have been executed, officials said Friday, in the latest sign that the effort by Pakistan's government to flush foreign militants from the region has gone badly awry.

The operation has proved a demoralizing embarrassment for Pakistan's army, the country's most powerful institution. While several dozen militants have been killed, and nearly 200 taken prisoner, the government does not appear to have captured the high-profile targets that it claimed last week to have surrounded in a mud-walled compound.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/27/international/asia/27STAN.html?hp

Friday, 26 March 2004 - 11:16 PM EST

8 Hostages Executed in Pakistan Siege
By AMY WALDMAN

Published: March 27, 2004

SLAMABAD, Pakistan, Saturday, March 27 ? Eight Pakistani soldiers who had been taken hostage by militants in Pakistan's tribal areas have been executed, officials said Friday, in the latest sign that the effort by Pakistan's government to flush foreign militants from the region has gone badly awry.

The operation has proved a demoralizing embarrassment for Pakistan's army, the country's most powerful institution. While several dozen militants have been killed, and nearly 200 taken prisoner, the government does not appear to have captured the high-profile targets that it claimed last week to have surrounded in a mud-walled compound.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/27/international/asia/27STAN.html?hp

Monday, 29 March 2004 - 6:13 PM EST

Attacks Rock U.S.-Ally Uzbekistan

TASHKENT, March 29, 2004
(CBS/AP) Two suicide bombings, attacks on police and an explosion at an alleged terrorist bomb-making factory in Uzbekistan killed 19 people and injured 26, the Central Asian country's prosecutor-general said Monday.

Prosecutor-general Rashid Kadyrov said the events began Sunday night with an explosion that killed 10 people at a house being used by an extremist in the central province of Bukhara.

There were also two attacks on police Sunday night and early Monday, killing three policemen, and two attempted suicide bombings near the Chorzu bazaar in Tashkent's Old City, killing three policemen and a young child, he said.

The explosions occurred after officials in Pakistan had said Saturday they had wounded the leader of a prominent Uzbek terror group linked to al Qaeda. The Pakistan army said Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan chief Tahir Yuldash was wounded in a military operation to track down terrorists in tribal areas near the Afghan border, but apparently escaped.

A series of near-simultaneous bombings in Tashkent in February 1999 were blamed on Yuldashev's group, which Pakistani officials say has been subsumed by al Qaeda since the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States. Uzbek authorities said those blasts, which killed 16 people, were an attempt to assassinate President Islam Karimov.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Ilkhom Zakirov said there were "several terrorist acts" and that arrests had been made.

Uzbekistan has been a strong supporter of U.S.-led campaign in Afghanistan, and American troops are using a military base at the southern city of Khanabad for operations.