Military Assaults

Sri Lankan forces shelled a makeshift hospital in the war zone Saturday, killing 64 civilians despite a pledge to stop using heavy weapons in its battle with the Tamil Tigers, a rebel-linked website said. A health official in the war zone confirmed that the hospital was hit twice by artillery through the day, but said he did not know who was responsible. The military denied launching the attack.

President Obama and the leaders of Pakistan and Afghanistan, setting aside months of friction, committed themselves again Wednesday to their faltering joint effort against Taliban and Al Qaeda extremists. After a day of talks, Obama said he was satisfied that the leaders "fully appreciate the seriousness of the threats we face and have reaffirmed their commitment to confronting it." Obama also moved to quell any doubts about U.S.

They stream down from the mountains, limping along in small groups, riding in battered cars, hanging off jampacked trucks and buses. Along with its long list of problems, the Pakistani government must now cope with hundreds of thousands of stressed and bedraggled civilians fleeing clashes between soldiers and militants.

Pakistani jets screamed over this Taliban-controlled town Friday and bombed suspected militant positions as hundreds of thousands fled and trapped residents appealed for a pause in the fighting so they could escape. Army spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas said 140 militants had been killed in the last 24 hours, in addition to about 150 already reported slain. He didn't provide figures for civilian deaths, but witnesses and local news reports say that some have been killed.

A joint U.S.-Afghan investigation confirmed that an unspecified number of civilians were killed in a southern Afghan battle, but the initial findings released Saturday appeared to blame Taliban militants who allegedly used villagers as "human shields." Officials in Farah province say dozens of civilians were killed in U.S. airstrikes. The U.S.-Afghan joint statement Saturday said troops called in airstrikes on militant positions during heavy fighting in two villages in Farah Monday and Tuesday.

Tens of thousands of civilians, many on foot or donkey-led carts, on Sunday took advantage of a lifted curfew to flee Pakistan's embattled Swat Valley, and the army said it had killed 400 to 500 militants in its battle against the Taliban. The hemorrhaging of residents from a scenic valley that once attracted hordes of tourists threatened to exacerbate an internal refugee crisis for a nuclear-armed nation already facing economic, political and other woes.

A mortar shell struck the only functioning medical facility in Sri Lanka's northern war zone today, killing 47 patients and bystanders and wounding more than 50 others, rebels and a health worker said. The attack came after a weekend of heavy shelling that killed hundreds of civilians, which the United Nations labeled a "blood bath." The military has denied that it was shelling the tiny coastal strip still under rebel control, which is packed with an estimated 50,000 civilians.

At the entrance to the Hazrat Usman camp just south of the Swat Valley, a welcoming committee greets those fleeing violence between the government and militants with a cool glass of water, a meal and a place to sleep with fans and a pharmacy. Though camp organizers don't voice any overt sympathy for the Taliban, their view is clear: The entire crisis is a creation of the government and the army. Two miles up the road sits the much larger government-run Jalala camp.

Artillery shells tore through a hospital packed with wounded civilians in Sri Lanka's war zone for a second day Wednesday, killing at least 50 people, setting an ambulance on fire and forcing the medical staff to huddle in bunkers for safety, doctors said.

The U.S. is jeopardizing its chances of success in Afghanistan by mistakenly inflicting casualties on civilians in airstrikes that undermine support for the war among the general population, the top U.S. military officer said Monday. Adm. Michael G.