January16, 2007: In Pakistan's South Waziristan, along the Afghan border, helicopter gunships attacked three Taliban camps, killing, killing at least thirty "foreign fighters." No ground troops went in to collect more information. The tribes are supposed to keep the foreign terrorists out, and the government is not supposed to make attacks like, according to a peace deal made with the tribes four months ago.

Bangladesh faces the real possibility of political collapse and civil war, if the January 22 elections are not accepted as fair by most of the population. Polarized political parties are increasing relying on large demonstrations to protest. If there is a total breakdown in order, the Islamic radicals have a shot at seizing more power.

January 15, 2007: In Pakistan, roadblocks manned by Taliban gunmen, near the Afghan border, are used to extort money, and search for enemies (police spies, or tribesmen they don't agree with). This is causing some uneasiness in the tribal territories, and a call for the government to do something about it. The Pakistani government insists that the Pakistani Taliban are a separate problem from the Afghan Taliban.

January 15, 2007: Indian generals complain that half their 1.2 million troops are already tied down in counter-terror operations in the northwest (against Islamic terrorists) and northeast (against tribal separatists), and have not got the manpower to help police deal with the increasingly violent Maoist rebels in eastern and southern India. The Maoist gangs are popular in many poor, and rural, parts of India. The Maoists are something like Robin Hood, in that they attack the local gentry, for the benefit of the poor, and the Moaists. The army considers the Maoists a police problem, and that they will apparently remain.

January 14, 2007: Four members of Pakistan's Atomic Energy Commission were kidnapped by persons unknown.

January 13, 2007: Pakistan is moving ahead with its plan to build a security fence on the Afghan border, in order to stop the Taliban and al Qaeda raids from camps inside Pakistan, which Pakistan insists do not exist.

In southeast India, police killed another Maoist leader, along with three of his associates.

January 12, 2007: The U.S. has again publicly accused Pakistan of ignoring Taliban and al Qaeda camps on its territory. In private, American officials badger the Pakistanis with more detailed evidence. The Pakistanis protest that an attack on those camps could trigger a tribal uprising among the Pushtun and Baluchi tribes (together, about ten percent of the countrys population). The U.S. is sympathetic to this, but American officials also have political pressure to defeat the Taliban and al Qaeda.