Pakistan detains 6 in connection to Malala attack

The bad guys

Pakistani police have arrested six men in connection with the shooting of 14-year-old activist Malala Yousafzai, but the primary suspect, identified as 23-year-old Attaullah Khan, remains at large (CNN, ET). Police said Khan had been working toward a master’s degree in chemistry in Swat. Malala’s parents left Pakistan for Britain on Thursday to be at their daughter’s bedside during what her father called a "miraculous" recovery (Tel).

Karen DeYoung of the Washington Post wrote Wednesday in the second installment of a three-part series that the Obama administration is compiling a "playbook" that sets down "a set of standards" for carrying out targeted killings, including whom to target, who should pull the trigger, and the legal justification for doing so (Post). The White House hopes the playbook will guide future president for years to come; its creation is being spearheaded by presidential counterterrorism adviser John Brennen, a veteran of the CIA and fierce defender of the U.S. drone campaign.

Ominous promises

Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar said in an emailed statement on Thursday on the eve of the Eid holiday that insider attacks by Afghan security forces on NATO troops will continue, and urged "every brave Afghan in the ranks of the foreign forces and their Afghan hirelings … to strike them" (AP). A British Marine and a female medic were killed in the Nahar-e-Saraj District of Helmand Province on Thursday, and one source in Afghanistan reportedly said it was an insider attack by an Afghan police officer or soldier (Tel, AFP, Guardian, BBC).

Although the U.S. Congress has passed legislation in 2009 allocating 7,500 visas to Afghans who support NATO’s war effort in Afghanistan, just 32 of over 5,700 applicants have been approved, leaving the vast majority of those people vulnerable to Taliban retribution (Post).

Baluchitherium

A massive herbivorous dinosaur that once walked the land we now call Balochistan is none other than the Baluchitherium, which stood at approximately 18 feet tall and weighed some 20 tons (ET). A life-size model of the ancient beast was unveiled at the Pakistan Museum of Natural History on Wednesday, and archeologists believe there could be many more undiscovered fossils in the Pakistan’s restive southwest.

— Jennifer Rowland