United News of Bangladesh

Pakistan on Monday urged Afghanistan's Taliban government to prevent militants from using Afghan territory to launch attacks inside Pakistan, warning again that the armed groups could eventually pose a threat to the Taliban's own rule. Tensions between the neighbouring countries have risen amid repeated border clashes and Pakistani airstrikes in Afghanistan, intensifying a longstanding dispute over militant activities. The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan said in September that it had documented more than 1,100 civilian deaths and injuries resulting from cross-border violence in Afghanistan this year. Speaking at a think tank event broadcast on Pakistani television, Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar said he had previously warned Afghan Prime Minister Mullah Mohammad Hasan Akhund about the threat during a visit to Kabul in July 2025. “I politely reminded him that if the Afghan authorities failed to take appropriate action against terrorist groups operating from their territory, the day would come when these very groups would threaten his government as well,” Dar said. He did not disclose how the Afghan authorities had responded. However, Afghan government spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid rejected Pakistan's allegations in a post on X, accusing Pakistani officials of undermining negotiations and prioritising propaganda over solutions. “Blaming Afghanistan for its own failures by Pakistani officials is no solution to any problem,” Mujahid wrote. Pakistan's Information Ministry rejected Mujahid's remarks, saying on X that Islamabad remained committed to dialogue but that progress depended on Kabul fulfilling its counterterrorism commitments and taking verifiable action against militant sanctuaries and support networks. Pakistan has repeatedly accused Kabul of sheltering the Pakistani Taliban, also known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), the outlawed Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) and al-Qaida in the Indian Subcontinent, an affiliate of the global extremist network. The TTP is separate from, but closely allied with, Afghanistan's ruling Taliban. Dar did not explain why he believed the militants could eventually turn against the Afghan Taliban. The Afghan Taliban government has repeatedly denied providing safe havens to militants targeting Pakistan. Dar said Pakistan's diplomatic and economic efforts to improve relations with Kabul had produced no meaningful progress on its main security demand: action against militants operating from Afghan territory. “Good neighbourly relations are a two-way responsibility,” he said. “They cannot mean silently absorbing one attack after another.” Dar said he visited Kabul three times in 2025 as Pakistan pursued expanded trade, upgraded diplomatic representation to the ambassadorial level and explored a railway link connecting Pakistan with Central Asia through Afghanistan. He said Pakistan wanted Afghanistan to be stable and prosperous but could no longer overlook what he described as a persistent militant threat across the border. “Attacks inside Pakistan are planned, directed and launched from across the border,” he said. “Terrorists infiltrate through mountainous terrain, target our soldiers and civilians, and retreat to their sanctuaries.” Dar said Pakistan's military had completed nearly 95% of a fence along its more than 2,600-kilometre (1,600-mile) border with Afghanistan. Construction of the fence began in 2017 following cross-border militant attacks on Pakistani army posts. Describing the TTP as one of Pakistan's most serious security threats, Dar cited attacks on schools, mosques, markets and security installations. He also accused the separatist BLA of targeting civilians, security personnel and economic infrastructure. Pakistan says more than 2,800 militant attacks since January have killed or injured around 3,000 people. Information Minister Attaullah Tarar, who spoke at the same event on Monday, blamed the rise in violence on militants based in Afghanistan, including the TTP. Citing UN and independent assessments, Tarar said Afghanistan was home to more than 6,000 TTP fighters and over 20,000 militants in total. He accused the TTP of using Afghan territory to recruit, train and plan attacks against Pakistan since the Afghan Taliban returned to power in 2021.

Five people were reported missing after a sudden flash flood in the Budhi Gandaki River swept away 65 houses across Gorkha and Dhading districts of central Nepal on Sunday morning. Armed Police Force spokesperson Netra Bahadur Karki told media that all five missing persons were reported from Gorkha district, adding that report collection remains ongoing. He said the flood also destroyed two motorable bridges and two suspension bridges. The flash flood was triggered by a landslide at Chumanubri Rural Municipality in Gorkha district, which temporarily dammed the Budhi Gandaki River, Nepal Army said by a statement. The river subsequently breached the landslide blockage, sending a sudden surge of water, mud, and debris that devastated settlements along its banks. Following the disaster, the Nepal Army airlifted 36 people to safer locations, while search and rescue operations remain underway by security forces.

Dhruv Rathee, an Indian influencer with millions of followers, said on Sunday that he was kidnapped, not arrested or detained, by men in plain clothes who took him from his bedroom and held him for nearly a day. “I am using the word ‘kidnap’ here because this is not an arrest, not a detention,” Dhruv said in a video message on X. No one showed a uniform or a nameplate, he said, or cited any section of law. He was taken on October 10, the day a youth group called the Cockroach Janata Party had planned a rally at Jantar Mantar in Delhi. The group, which emerged only a few months ago, wants the chief election commissioner, Gyanesh Kumar, to resign. It accuses him of removing the names of more than 130 million voters from the lists, a step it says favored the governing Bharatiya Janata Party of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Delhi police and other forces, including members of the Border Security Force, were deployed across the city and blocked the roads to Jantar Mantar, keeping the protesters from the venue. More than 7,000 protesters were detained temporarily, including the top leaders of the group, Rathee said.  Narendra Modi has been in power for more than a decade. Rathee described the morning of October 10. At about 7 am, as he slept, his mother opened the front door because many people were standing outside. About 20 of them pushed past her and came into the house, he said. His mother screamed, he said, and the men went straight to his bedroom. Only his parents were home with him. He said he woke as the door opened and had no time to react. He said he asked who the men were and was given no chance to speak. They dragged him down the stairs, injuring him, and did not let him put on his slippers. They put him in a jeep and drove him to one police station and then another. More than 50 people were waiting outside the house, he said. His phone and his parents' phones were taken. He said his parents were beaten and assaulted. At the police station, he said, he asked for a lawyer and was refused. He was also kept from using a phone. For 22 to 23 hours, he said, no one told him why, beyond saying it was neither an arrest nor a detention and that he would be released. A detention would have come at a protest, he said, and an arrest from an officer who named the sections of law. “This is directly an unofficial emergency,” he said. He asked whether such a thing happened in any democratic country to a citizen who had broken no law and had only demanded a better Election Commission. He compared it to the Emergency and to North Korea. “Narendra Modi has turned this country into a dictatorship,” he said. Rathee said he later heard that other leaders, including Abhijit Dipke, Sourav Das and Ashutosh Ranka, had been pulled off an airplane. He put the number of people detained at more than 7,000. He also took on reports that he held a foreign passport and that he is not allowed to take part in the protest. Pro-government news outlets, which he calls “Godi Media,” or lapdog media, had used the claims to justify his detention, he said. “I am, was, and will remain an Indian citizen,” he said, calling the claim “an absolute lie.” He said he had the same rights as any ordinary citizen. Rathee said he was now at home and in good condition. But at least 15 people had been left around him, watching his every move so that he could not leave, he said. He called it an unofficial house arrest. He argued that the treatment of one citizen should worry everyone. Some people who dislike him had been pleased to see it happen, he said. “If this can happen to me, it can happen to you tomorrow,” he said. He asked whether people wanted to live in a country where they had no chance to raise their voices. Dictators, he said, come to a bad end, and he named Hitler and Mussolini. He thanked Sonam Wangchuk, who he said had warned the government that he would go on a hunger strike if Rathee and the others were not released within a day. Wangchuk is an Indian educator.  “I will continue to raise my voice for the country, no matter how much you try to suppress it,” Rathee said. To Mr. Modi, he had a message. “Don't scare anyone so much that all fear disappears,” he said.

India’s Supreme Court has directed authorities to remove barricades unless they are “absolutely warranted” and withdraw restrictions on large gatherings around the court amid protests by the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP). A special bench of Justices Joymalya Bagchi and V Mohana issued the directions on Sunday while hearing a contempt petition challenging the closure of Delhi Metro stations in connection with the protests. The bench also directed authorities to withdraw the restrictions imposed under Section 163 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), 2023, which prohibits large gatherings. “We have been informed that a notice under Section 163 has been imposed in and around the Supreme Court. We direct the authorities to take down the restriction so that there is no apprehension of access to justice with regard to ingress and egress to the Supreme Court or any other court,” the bench said. The court said the free movement of people should be restored to normal, subject to necessary regulation in situations involving public order. The observations came on a contempt petition filed by lawyer Shailendra Mani Tripathi. The petition referred to the Supreme Court’s October 9 order in a separate case challenging the closure of 57 metro stations and the cancellation of trains to Delhi ahead of the planned CJP protest. The bench said people have the right to protest but must exercise that right within the framework of the Police Act. “You have a right to protest, absolutely no quarrel on that but the process in which you protest has to be within the Police Act,” the court said. Justice Bagchi told the petitioner that the right to protest could not be considered above the Police Act. The Supreme Court subsequently issued notices to the authorities, including the Delhi Police, the Union Home Secretary and the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC), seeking responses on the detentions and the circumstances surrounding them. Source: NDTV

Residents along the Budhi Gandaki river in north central Nepal were evacuated on Sunday as a sudden flash flood destroyed homes and other structures across the area, officials said. The National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority evacuated villagers and warned others along the riverbank to relocate to safer areas while remaining on high alert through late Sunday. No casualties were immediately reported. Disaster management officials are working to determine the cause of the flash flood along the Budhi Gandaki, a key waterway near the capital Kathmandu that merges into the Trishuli river. Social media videos showed houses and sheds being swept away by the swollen river flowing between tall mountains. While the total number of impacted mountain villages remains unclear, government warnings prompted an evacuation in Arughat, a strategic riverside town on the highway connecting Kathmandu to other parts of the country. The disaster strikes as Nepal continues to recover from a catastrophic August flood along the mountainous Nepal-China border that killed more than 1,400 people and left thousands missing. The office of Nepal Prime Minister Balendra Shah on Monday announced an end to search and rescue operations for additional victims from the August floods. Authorities will instead concentrate on recovery, including the restoration of roads and bridges cut off by flooding, particularly in remote areas where damaged infrastructure has hindered aid delivery. The Nepalese government estimates the total rebuilding effort from the August floods will cost $4.77 billion, with nearly 33,000 people affected and about 7,500 homes damaged or destroyed.

Pakistan’s ruling coalition has finalised a plan to bring Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) under federal control by invoking constitutional provisions for emergency and governor’s rule amid escalating tensions with the opposition Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI). Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has convened a federal cabinet meeting on Sunday to discuss the proposed measures, while separate sessions of the National Assembly and Senate are scheduled for Tuesday, according to sources familiar with the developments. The move comes as PTI, which governs KP, continues its protest march, raising fears of a confrontation with the federal government. Sharif held separate meetings with President Asif Ali Zardari and Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam (JUI-F) chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman on Saturday to discuss ways to ease tensions. Fazlur Rehman also met PTI Chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan and Asad Qaiser to inform them about the government’s possible move if the party continued its march. A senior JUI-F leader said the party was facilitating dialogue between the government and the opposition, but the final decision rested with both sides. Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi said the government had exhausted its efforts to reach an understanding with PTI, adding that “there was no room left to avoid the imposition of an emergency in KP.” Information Minister Ataullah Tarar confirmed that the cabinet would discuss the options of emergency and governor’s rule. Minister of State for Interior Affairs Tallal Chaudhry said several options were being considered, accusing PTI of failing to cooperate with the federal government on counterterrorism efforts and making statements against national policy during the march. A senior KP government official told that all deputy commissioners and district police officers across the province had been instructed to remain in their respective districts until further orders. Meanwhile, KP Police Chief Zulfiqar Hameed issued guidelines to district police officers to prepare for possible violent protests and sabotage if emergency rule is announced. Police stations have been directed to identify vulnerable locations along the protest route and deploy adequate personnel to protect them. Source: The Dawn

A local court in New Delhi on Sunday released three leaders of the satirical political group Cockroach Janta Party (CJP), directing them not to engage in any activity that could breach the peace for one year, sources said. Abhijeet Dipke, Saurav Das and Ashutosh Ranka were brought before an executive magistrate in Delhi Cantonment after being taken into preventive custody earlier in the day. They had been detained on Saturday after arriving in Delhi by plane. Their detention came on the second day of planned protests against Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar over alleged irregularities in the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of voter rolls. More than 3,000 protesters, including politicians, were detained on Saturday and released later that night. Police imposed heavy security across the capital to prevent demonstrators from gathering at Jantar Mantar in central Delhi, forcing them to split into smaller groups at different locations. YouTube activist Dhruv Rathee, a supporter of Congress MP Rahul Gandhi and a vocal critic of the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government, was among those released late Saturday. The Supreme Court was expected to hold a special sitting on Sunday to hear a contempt petition over the blanket closure of Delhi Metro stations and train services on Saturday. Metro services resumed on Sunday morning amid a heavy security presence at station entrances and exits, with buses parked nearby to transport detained protesters. On Friday, a bench comprising Chief Justice of India Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and V Mohana had directed that metro services should not be completely suspended ahead of Saturday’s planned protest. CJP organisers have vowed to continue street demonstrations until accountability is established over alleged deletion and manipulation of 13 crore votes. They accused authorities of imposing an “undeclared emergency” in the capital to prevent people from assembling peacefully. Founded by Dipke, a Boston University graduate who returned to India to lead protests over alleged NEET examination paper leaks, the CJP has received support from opposition parties across the country. The BJP has accused the group of acting as an extension of opposition forces seeking to destabilise the country. BJP president Nitin Nabin alleged that opposition groups were attempting to harm India under the direction of “foreign forces”. Defence Minister Rajnath Singh said everyone had the right to express dissent in a democracy but warned that the right did not extend to creating anarchy. He added that members of Generation Z might be temporarily misled but could not be diverted from the goal of nation-building. Source: NDTV

The United Nations human rights office on Saturday expressed concern over mass detentions carried out before and during protests in New Delhi, India. "We are concerned by reports of mass detentions in India of demonstrators, protest leaders, members of civil society organisations, lawyers and journalists, before and during Saturday’s large-scale demonstrations in Delhi," it said in a statement. The office also called on the authorities to ensure that the right to peaceful assembly is fully respected and fulfilled. "Restrictions on peaceful protests must meet strict tests of necessity and proportionality." The Indian authorities should also ensure law enforcement forces exercise utmost restraint in response to peaceful protesters, consistent with the country’s democratic traditions and human rights obligations. All those arbitrarily detained must be immediately and unconditionally released, the UN rights body said. It also urged the authorities to engage in meaningful dialogue to address the broadly held concerns that were expressed.

Former West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, former Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and former Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan were among opposition leaders detained by Delhi Police on Saturday as they tried to join a protest near Jantar Mantar in the Indian capital. Trinamool Congress chief Banerjee was detained along with five of her party MPs, including Derek O'Brien and Dola Sen, from South Avenue in central Delhi after police stopped them from proceeding. Banerjee staged a sit-in at a bus stop with a bandage taped over her mouth before being taken away in a police bus. “The government is misbehaving with us,” she said in a video statement from inside the bus. “We the INDIA alliance will continue to fight to strengthen people's voice,” she added. Kejriwal, whose residence had been surrounded by police since morning, was also detained when he tried to leave his home to join the protest. In a video message after his detention, the Aam Aadmi Party leader said the country's youth would not be intimidated by the crackdown. “Youth of India will not be scared. We will fight against vote chori. Everyone should come out and protest,” he said. Vijayan and Communist Party of India (Marxist) MP John Brittas were among those taken to the detention centre at Chhatrasal Stadium. Several other opposition figures and student leaders were also detained while attempting to reach the protest site. Banerjee arrived in Delhi on Friday to join the opposition's demonstration against Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar. She was part of an INDIA bloc delegation that met President Droupadi Murmu on Friday evening, demanding Kumar's removal. During the meeting, opposition leaders raised allegations of “vote chori” (vote theft), seeking Kumar's resignation and the repeal of all Assembly elections held over the past two years. Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi later said he was “shocked” that the President had not denied the allegations of election theft. However, sources subsequently said claims suggesting that Murmu had accepted the opposition's allegations were incorrect. Gandhi said opposition leaders would meet Chief Justice Surya Kant at the Supreme Court on Monday and submit a memorandum as part of their efforts to pursue all available options. The INDIA alliance has also announced a major protest on Monday over alleged irregularities by the Election Commission. Source: NDTV

Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) founder Abhijeet Dipke has handed over the responsibility of leading the party’s protest movement to organisation in-charge Ajinkya Shinde following his detention by Delhi Police along with two other senior members. In a pre-recorded video posted on the party’s X account on Saturday, Dipke said Shinde would lead the protest until the detained leaders were released. “If you are watching this video, it means that I, Saurav Das and Ashutosh Ranka have been arrested. In our absence, Ajinkya will lead the protest and the CJP movement. Please follow him,” Dipke said. The video was posted shortly after Dipke was detained from a flight arriving in the Indian capital from Mumbai, where he and other CJP members had travelled to lead a protest against Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar. In a separate video statement, Shinde urged supporters to continue heading towards Jantar Mantar, the designated protest area, and stage demonstrations wherever police stopped them. “The government is scared of our unity. Please come to Jantar Mantar. If police stops you, turn that very spot into Jantar Mantar,” he said. Shinde, a Maharashtra-based activist, has been a close associate of Dipke for years. He previously worked as a social media coordinator for the Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) Maharashtra team after leaving his corporate job to work full-time for the party. He reportedly first met Dipke in Goa in 2016 and later spent a year working for AAP during the Goa Assembly elections. Although the party failed to win any seat in the state, Shinde continued working with its Maharashtra team and reportedly travelled across every district in the state. He hails from Alibaug, a coastal town in Maharashtra. Several CJP leaders and protesters have been detained since Saturday morning ahead of the planned demonstration. Delhi Police had denied permission for the protest, saying the organisers had not sought approval sufficiently in advance. YouTuber Dhruv Rathee, a vocal critic of the Narendra Modi government, was also detained from his home in Gurugram on Saturday morning. Rathee had returned to India from Germany earlier this week and joined the CJP protest in Bengaluru on October 8. Tensions escalated around Jantar Mantar as police detained demonstrators attempting to reach the protest site. The detainees were bundled into police buses and taken to Chhatrasal Stadium in the capital. Police also arrested at least 400 protesters in an overnight crackdown across different parts of Delhi. Source: NDTV