An unidentified explosive device has detonated in the city of Stavropol in the south of Russia, killing five and injuring at least 40 more people, reports RT.

The blast rocked the center of the city, not far from the Culture and Sport Palace.

Police say the bomb was attached to the wall of a cafe, which was closed at the time. There are conflicting reports as to whether one or two explosive devices went off.

“At 18:45 Moscow time (14:45 GMT) a bomb exploded on Lenin Street, near the city’s community center,” said Interior Ministry deputy spokesperson Pavel Klimovsky. “Investigators and the emergency services are working at the scene. A number of people have been killed and injured. They have been taken to hospital. At the moment everything is being done to establish what kind of explosive was used and its exact position. It’s believed to have been placed in a kiosk between a café and the city community center. Experts are collecting evidence for a criminal case.”

Rescuers, police and federal security service officers are on the site. Officials say a terrorist attack is not being ruled out.

The attack follows a recent spate of bombings throughout Russia’s south and in Moscow. On March 29th,  38 people were killed and more than 60 injured as suicide bombers detonated themselves at the Lubyanka and Park Kultury metro stops.

Monday’s Metro bombings have chilling echoes of the last time Moscow’s commuters were targeted, reports RT.

Chechen militants were blamed for killing 41 on a train six years ago, with Russia’s most-wanted terrorist suspected of being involved. That man, the notorious Chechen militant Doku Umarov, is again under suspicion.

Russia’s top security official has said that investigators consider the attack by North Caucasus terrorists the most likely scenario in the Monday metro blasts case.

“According to preliminary information, these acts were committed by terror groups linked to North Caucasus,” stated Aleksandr Bortnikov, the director of the Federal Security Service. “We will consider this the main version of events as the bodies of two female suicide bombers who were residing in the North Caucasus were found at the sites.”

Umarov, 46, is thought to be one of those who organized the Beslan school siege in 2004, which ended in a blood bath.

Along with the investigation in Moscow, another has begun in the South of Russia. Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov says he is ready to give all assistance possible to the investigators.

“We are ready to cooperate,” said Ramzan Kadyrov, the president of Chechen Republic. “We have the experience, we have the law enforcement structures and special services – they know all the ins and outs. We all witnessed what these people did in the Chechen Republic: they are trying to scare ordinary people and undermine the rapidly expanding economy, locally and throughout the country.”

The latest attack is widely believed to be in retaliation to successful police and security operations in Russia’s North Caucasus.

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Colombian president Alvaro Uribe on Sunday opened the doors to a possible humanitarian exchange with the FARC in order to secure the release of the remaining hostages in FARC custody.

According to Uribe, his government is “not against a humanitarian exchange provided that the released FARC fighters do not return to the FARC,” reports Caracol Radio, adding that “a humanitarian agreement is not to strengthen terrorism, but to liberate the Colombians from terrorist actions.”

The president noted, however, that “good faith” must be established prior to negotiations, referring to the car bomb attack last week in Pacific coastal town of Buenaventura that killed nine.

“To move forward with peace agreements in the midst of car bombs is taking a bow to terrorism.. The first thing needed for an agreement is good faith….And that a key signal of good faith ceasing all criminal activity.”

Uribe’s statements, made after a security meeting in department of Arauca, came a few hours after the FARC released hostage Josue Daniel Calvo.

Read more here.

Iranian security forces have killed several members of the terrorist group, Jundallah during a clash southeast of Iran, reports Press TV.

The clash took place when the terrorists tried to enter Iran from Pakistan.

Among the dead is a key member of Jundallah, Barekat Zamrani, who was behind the assassination of Brigadier General Nur-Ali Shoushtari, a top commander of Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps.

Zamrani accompanied other Jundallah members during terrorist operations.

Two other terrorists were also captured during the clash.

On February 23, the leader of the Jundallah, Abdulmalek Rigi, was on a flight from the United Arab Emirates to Kyrgyzstan when he was tracked down and captured by Iranian security forces.

Rigi and one of his deputies were captured after Iranian security forces pulled down the plane they were traveling in and forced it to land at Bandar Abbas airport.

Following his arrest, Rigi also confessed on television that the US administration had promised to provide him with unlimited military assistance and funding to conduct terror operations inside Iran.

The US along with a number of European countries were quick to deny any links to Rigi and paying for the many acts of terrorism he committed against Iranians over the past few years.

The Pakistan-based terrorist group is responsible for a series of terrorist attacks inside Iran, which have claimed over 140 lives.

A Pakistani court on Wednesday charged five Americans with funnelling money to outlaws and plotting a terror attack that could see them jailed for life if found guilty, lawyers said.

The five men aged 19 to 25 denied the seven charges read out by Judge Anwar Nazeer in an anti-terrorism court convened under tight security at the district jail of the eastern city of Sargodha, where they were arrested in December.

“Charges have been laid against all the accused. All these charges are terrorism-related. The offences are punishable by life imprisonment,” defence lawyer Shahid Kamal told reporters.

The court named the five as Umar Farooq, Waqar Hussain, Rami Zamzam, Ahmad Abdullah Mini and Amman Hassan Yammer, defence lawyer Hasan Dastagir told AFP.

“A total of seven charges have been laid against them. They include funding a banned or proscribed organisation and helping out a banned organisation. One of the charges is conspiring to carry out a terrorist attack within Pakistan or an allied country,” he added.

Prosecutors and police had long called for the five men to be charged with plotting militant attacks in Pakistan and attempting to commit an act of terror against countries that are at peace with Pakistan.

Although those countries have not been named, Pakistani officials have said the young men planned to travel to neighbouring Afghanistan and join up with Taliban-led militants fighting US and Nato troops.

The men professed their innocence Wednesday, lawyers told reporters who were banned from attending the closed-doors hearing.

Read more here.

Police in the southern Russian republic of Dagestan have launched a criminal investigation into a terrorist attack on Thursday evening in which 14 empty freight train carriages derailed due to an explosion, reports Russia Today.

The blast damaged a small section of the tracks and caused a 30-centimeter-deep crater.

Though no one was killed or injured, almost 700 people remain unable to continue their journeys.

Demolition experts are working at the scene.

This is second explosion on the tracks in Makhachkala in a month.

In February, a suspected terrorist blew himself up while trying to plant a bomb.

Terrorism and militancy are being fanned to destabilise the economy of the country which is at the threshold of a double digit growth, Union Home Minister P Chidambaram on Wednesday said.

He said hostile forces seek to undermine the security and stability of our nation.

“Even while they (hostile forces) challenge our borders and our boundaries, they make attempts to destabilize our economy. Terrorism and militancy are being fanned to hinder the growth of our country,” Chidambaram said in his address at the CISF Raising Day Parade here.

He said since the 1980’s, India has emerged as one of the most happening economies of the world. “The past decade has seen good growth and our economy is on the threshold of a double digit growth,” Chidambaram said.

He said the country’s growth depends on infrastructure and the CISF, which guards some of the most critical installations, is securing India’s future.

Read more here.

“General Fonseka, who dedicated himself to eradicate terrorism from this land, was apprehended the way a terrorist is seized and Rajapakse regime, by carrying out the move, attacked without any shame, what was left of democracy in the country said Leader of the JVP Somawansa Amarasinghe.   He said this speaking at a press conference held at the office of Gen. Sarath Fonseka today (9th).

Speaking further Mr. Amarasinghe said, “The officers who came to arrest Gen. Fonseka took him as if a terrorist was seized. I was there at the time. I saw all that with my eyes. We informed the incident to the media immediately. The security officials had taken away cameras and other equipment of the journalists who were present there. We also informed the world regarding this incident. Now the world is aware of this incident.

Now we have a question to ask from the masses in this country. Do you endorse this treatment meted out to the Army Commander who gave leadership to defeat terrorism in the country, who, without any concern for his own life, dedicated himself to bring victory to the Motherland? We also ask those who cast their votes to Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse whether they approve the move?

We also should mention that there are many Army officers who are being detained. We have to find out whether it is legal to detain them in that manner. The government accuses them of conspiracy, a coup and factionalizing of the Army. This is all because Gen. Sarath Fonseka contested Mr. Mahinda Rajapakse at the presidential election. Mahinda Rajapakse could   not establish the cultured society that should have been created after defeating terrorism. The wrong Gen. Fonseka did, according to the thinking of Mahinda Rajapakse and his clan, was the eradication of terrorism and coming forward to create a just and cultured society.

The general election will be held soon. Gen. Fonseka would be a great challenge to Mahinda Rajapakse regime. This is one of the reasons for the arrest of Gen. Fonseka. Mahinda Rajapakse has attacked what was left of democracy in the Motherland without any fear or shame. We would like to ask whether this is the end of democracy in the country.”

Read more here.

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Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi on Tuesday said the hydra-headed menace of terrorism was our common enemy and no one country could battle it out alone.

He termed the Friends of Democratic Pakistan “a collective determination against an evil mindset” and urged the international community to address root causes of terrorism such as poverty and unemployment.

The foreign minister was addressing the Friends of Democratic Pakistan’s Public-Private Partnership Conference in Dubai.

He said the three-year plan of reconstruction and rehabilitation in Malakand comprised close to 500 projects and would cost about $ 300 million.

The five year development plan, based on Post-crisis Needs Assessment, would cost around $1.2 billion, and the FoDP must expedite its process to complete these projects, the minister said.

Pakistan has suffered huge economic losses of over $35 billion since September 11 in terms of infrastructure, investment and exports, Qureshi said.

Read more here.

As leaders meet in London this week to discuss countermeasures to Al-Qaeda’s growing threat in Yemen, one man here is hoping to fight terrorism with rap. “No Terrorists Please,” the soon-to-be-released single by Yemeni-American rapper Hagage “AJ” Masaed, targets both Yemeni youth and adults with an anti-extremist message of peace and tolerance.

He seems qualified. Dressed in hip-hop style, with baggy black jeans, but none of the bling jewelry and accessories that rappers often don, he is relaxed, good-natured and modest, combining Yemeni and American qualities. He speaks as if he’s been a friend for many years. “No Terrorists Please” has AJ’s trademark mix of American-English and Yemeni-Arabic rap, and an easy blend of hip-hop beats with traditional Arabic sounds and instruments like the oud and mizmar (a reed instrument).

The inspiration for the song first came to him when Korean tourists to Yemen were attacked by an 18-year-old last March.
“I got so upset when the Koreans came to visit Yemen and the kid blew himself up, killing them,” Masaed said. “I kept thinking, ‘Why did they have to die, because they were curious and wanted to visit Yemen?’ I was so upset with it, and I felt like, he was a young kid who was influenced by other people. That was probably the bottom line.”

The song’s first verse is a statement to distance the majority of Yemenis, AJ says, from the terrorist groups’ extremist ideology and violent tactics. “Yes man, in Yemen, al-watan [the nation], my home / Al-Qaeda, not welcome, so let it be known / irhabeeyeen [terrorists] ain’t wanted / No, no terrorists please.”

In the second verse, AJ explicitly labels Al-Qaeda members as “terrorists” and questions the group’s ideology: “Are they targeting ajanib [Westerners] or white T’s and blue jeans?”

Adopting an instructive tone, he tells Yemenis, “You know if terrorists strike, hoo ihna thee nikhsar [we are the ones who lose].” The UK’s recent ban on direct flights from Yemen is perhaps one example of Yemen’s suffering as a result of terrorism.

Read more here.

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