8 killed in Afghanistan

Kandahar:

Taliban militants shot dead seven Afghan civilians after finding a registration document for Sunday’s milestone elections in their car on Tuesday, a provincial governor said on Wednesday. In another incident on Tuesday, Taliban guerrillas hanged an intelligence official in the southeastern province of Zabul, a known hotbed for the ousted hardline militia, police said.— AFP

Shiite shot dead in Pak

QUETTA:

Unidentified gunmen shot dead a Shiite Muslim on Wednesday in the third targeted killing of members of the minority community in the past two weeks in southwest Pakistan, police said. Two attackers sprayed bullets at Ijaz Jaffery as he went to the government office where he worked as a clerk in Quetta, the capital of restive Baluchistan province. — AFP

Death for bombing

JAKARTA:

Indonesia on Wednesday handed down its second death sentence in as many days for another Islamic militant convicted of terrorism in last year’s suicide bombing of the Australian embassy in Jakarta. Achmad Hasan, 33, had been charged with helping to plan the bombing, which killed 11 people. — AFP

Pickpocket rewarded

Dhaka:

Bangladesh police have rewarded a pickpocket for providing vital clues linking a banned hardline Islamic group to a wave of blasts that rocked the Muslim country last month, an official said on Wednesday. Police gave pickpocket Rawshan Ali a goat and $190 after his description of a man planting a bomb led to the arrest of an alleged member of Jamayetul Mujahideen. — AFP