Morning Brief: Mosque bombing in Pakistan

Top Story A suicide attack killed over 50 people at a mosque in Northwest Pakistan in the country’s deadliest attack this year. The attack near the Afghanistan-Pakistan border completely demolished the mosque and is thought to have killed many members of Pakistan’s paramilitary Frontier Corps. The Obama administration will release its new strategy for the ...

By , a former associate editor at Foreign Policy.
587407_090327_mosque2.jpg
587407_090327_mosque2.jpg
Pakistani tribesmen search for victims amidst the debris at the site of a suicide blast at a mosque in the town of Jamrud on March 27, 2009. A suicide bomber blew himself up in a packed mosque in northwest Pakistan at Friday prayers, killing 48 people and wounding dozens in one of the deadliest attacks in the nuclear-armed nation. The bombing took place on the weekly Muslim day of rest in the town of Jamrud in the restive Khyber tribal region, which is located on a key road used to ferry supplies to Western troops across the border in Afghanistan. AFP PHOTO/ Tariq MAHMOOD (Photo credit should read TARIQ MAHMOOD/AFP/Getty Images)

Top Story

Top Story

A suicide attack killed over 50 people at a mosque in Northwest Pakistan in the country’s deadliest attack this year. The attack near the Afghanistan-Pakistan border completely demolished the mosque and is thought to have killed many members of Pakistan’s paramilitary Frontier Corps.

The Obama administration will release its new strategy for the war in Afghanistan, which will likely focus more on quelling the insurgency in order to preserve stability in Afghanistan and Pakistan as opposed to the Bush administration’s broader nation-building goals for the country.

Middle East

Israel says it has successfully tested a new anti-rocket system.

Police have dropped one of the corruption charges against Israeli PM Ehud Olmert.

Sixteen people were killed in a bombing at a bus stop in Baghdad.

Asia

North Korea has positioned a rocket on a launch pad in preparation for April’s launch.

The U.S. is still working to keep its airbase in Kyrgyzstan open.

A massive dam collapse caused deadly flash-floods near Jakarta, Indonesia.

Africa

Israel attacked a convoy of trucks bringing weapons to Hamas in January, various news outlets are reporting. FP‘s Laura Rozen has more. 

There’s still no word from the European tankers taken by Somali pirates yesterday.

Kenyan police are reportedly holding a man wanted for war crimes in former Yugoslavia.

European

The Czech Republic’s opposition Social Democrats are working to form a coalition after the collaprse of Mirek Topolanek’s center-right government.

Workers at a French 3M plant have freed their boss after holding him hostage for over 24 hours.

New data shows the British economy declining even faster than previously thought.

Americas

The Obama administration has raised eyebrows in Mexico by appointing an expert in failed states as its new ambassador.

The U.S. is cracking down on “parallel exchange” trading between the U.S. and Venezuela.

The U.S. Senate approved the largest expansion of public service programs since the 1960s.

TARIQ MAHMOOD/AFP/Getty Images

Joshua Keating is a former associate editor at Foreign Policy. Twitter: @joshuakeating

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