Rebel News - Independent News and Analysis

Afghan President Hamid Karzai has arrived in Pakistan to discuss the extradition of recently captured militant leaders.

Karzai arrived in Islamabad on Wednesday evening and will stay through Thursday. It is the Afghan leader's first trip to Pakistan since he was re-elected in a disputed presidential election in August.

A US charity organization, World Vision, says militants have killed at least seven of its workers in the troubled northwestern Pakistan.

Earlier reports said that five people had been killed in the Wednesday attack that undermined the already deteriorating security of the militancy-hit country.

British Foreign Secretary David Miliband has called on the Afghan government to work harder in order to achieve a peace agreement with the Taliban.

Miliband's comments, in a speech to be delivered at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) later on Wednesday, reflect increasing recognition in the West that the Taliban militants who break ties to al Qaeda could play a role in the country's future.

Militants have attacked the offices of a US-based charity in northwest Pakistan, sparking heavy clashes with police that led to the killing of at least five people.

The unidentified gunmen stormed a building used by World Vision near Oghi town, in Mansehra district of North West Frontier Province on Wednesday, police said.

NATO forces are facing a shortfall of military trainers in Afghanistan, as European states refuse to contribute more troops to the war-torn country.

Admiral James Stavridis, head of the US military's European Command, said Tuesday that the NATO-run command has received only 541 of the promised 1,278 trainers needed in Afghanistan.

Myanmar's new election laws have barred opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi from joining a political party, and thus from running in elections planned this year.

Myanmar's state-run newspapers on Wednesday published the Political Parties Registration Law, according to which more than 2,000 political prisoners including Aung San Suu Kyi are barred from contesting a general election.

Violence has claimed 19 lives in southern Afghanistan as the US secretary of defense visits the country.

A roadside bomb killed three policemen and a civilian in Spin Bolkdek in Kandahar province.

A group of South Korean anti-war protesters have denounced their government's joint military drills with US forces.

The pro-peace protesters held their rally near a US military base south of Seoul.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang says Beijing insists that diplomacy is the only way to end the standoff over Iran's nuclear program.

"We have said all along that the Iranian nuclear issue has to be peacefully resolved by diplomatic means through dialogue and negotiations," AFP quoted Qin as saying on Tuesday.

Japan has verified the existence of a secret nuclear pact with the United States that allows US forces to bring nuclear weapons into the country.

Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada said on Tuesday that a panel of experts confirmed the existence of the pact after examining thousands of documents over a period of months.