Afghan political and religious leaders have called for the start of a peace process to end conflict with the Taliban, offering the country’s president a mandate to open negotiations with the group.

More than 118 people have been killed after a fire engulfed several buildings in the centre of Dhaka, the Bangladeshi capital, according to government officials.

Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president, has opened a three-day peace conference in the capital, Kabul, amid rocket fire and at least one suicide bombing.

The US government has said that it killed Mustafa Abu al-Yazid, an Egyptian man described as al-Qaeda’s “number three” official.

A roadside bomb has killed seven police officers and injured another in Badakhshan, a remote northeastern province of Afghanistan, officials say.

Bangladesh has blocked social networking website Facebook over caricatures of the Prophet Mohammad and “obnoxious” images of the Muslim-majority country’s leaders, officials say.

KUNAR: Taliban militants captured the administrative headquarters of a remote Afghan district Saturday, officials said, while a suicide bomber blew himself up near a Nato base in Kabul.

A US drone attack which left 23 Afghan civilians dead when they were mistaken for Taliban fighters occurred due to the “unprofessional” approach of the soldiers involved, an internal military report has found.

LAHORE: Eighty people were killed and over 120 others injured when armed men launched simultaneous attacks on worship places of Qadianis in Garhi Shahu and Model Town areas here on Friday. The assailants made the worshippers hostages after making their way to both the worship places, hurling hand grenades and spraying volleys of bullets.

PESHAWAR – At least 11 suspected militants were killed and three others got injured in a US drone attack in South Waziristan Agency on Friday.