Niaz Ahmad Khan is a correspondent for RFE/RL's Radio Mashaal in Swat, Pakistan.
Parents of Pakistani students in Kyrgyzstan held a protest following attacks on foreign students in Kyrgyzstan, demanding the Kyrgyz government provide security for their children. The demonstration was held in Swat Valley on May 20.
In Pakistan, hundreds of supporters of jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan took to the streets of the city of Swat to demand the release of their leader. In Peshawar, hundreds of activists from the religious party Jamiat Ulema Islam (JUI) held a protest rally on May 9, demanding new elections.
Pakistani authorities have cracked down on undocumented foreigners, mostly Afghans, ahead of a deadline to leave the country or face deportation. In Karachi, Afghan men and boys on November 1 were put on buses and taken to a temporary detention center.
Two people have been killed in two separate attacks in northwestern Pakistan, locals and officials say.
This week’s transfer of authority comes 11 years after the Pakistani army first moved into the scenic Swat Valley in 2007 to take on a Taliban rebellion.
Seven opposition political parties in a restive northwestern district are opposing the powerful Pakistani military's deployment during the by-elections.
Severe power cuts during the holy month of Ramadan, when most of Pakistan’s estimated 200 million Muslims refrain from eating and drinking from dawn to dusk, have prompted violent protests in the scorching temperatures of summer.
