According to motorway police, the bus driver, taking a rash turn committed mistake as he lost control, letting bus meet head-on collision with a truck parked on roadside at Bhera point on Faisalabad-Rawalpindi motorway.

At least six passengers lost their lives including bus driver, conductor and a woman while over 10 injured.

Wounded have been shifted to hospitals. Most died were heading to their hometowns on Eid holidays.

A “low-intensity package bomb was left outside the Administrative Department of Security (DAS) building, next to a lamppost, by a man who then ran away,” Pasto Red Cross official Henry Palacios told media.

He said 12 passersby and workers from the DAS building were wounded in the blast and taken to area hospitals.

Narino department Governor Antonio Navarro told Caracol radio that two of the wounded were in serious condition and that the damage wrought by the bomb was considerable.

He said authorities suspect the bombing was the work of the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), the country’’s oldest and strongest rebel group.

Shortly after the blast, DAS agents detained a man and a woman who were leaving the area in a taxi and are suspected of being behind the blast, DAS Director Felipe Munoz said.

The latest strike hit North Waziristan, the same tribal district targeted in three other drone attacks in the past 24 hours and a renowned hub for Taliban and Al-Qaeda-linked militants.

A total of 24 militants were killed in the four strikes.

The target of the fourth drone attack was a compound in outskirts of Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan.

“Two US drones fired three missiles. We have reports that four militants were killed,” a security official based in Peshawar told media.

Two intelligence officials in Miranshah also confirmed the attack and the death toll.

He feared the government-run HEC may have to face judicial case if it failed to pay off on time the dues meant for educational development plans.

“The government of Pakistan slashed HEC’s budget from 22.50 billion rupees to 18.50 billion rupees for fiscal year 2010 in March this year but despite mounting directives issued from Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani, HEC has been provided mere 11 billion rupees during period from July to December 2009”, revealed the chairman of HEC Dr. Javaid Laghari.

Not a single penny has been released to HEC in last quarter for 2009 fiscal year, he maintained.

In just three days, a drilling rig has bored down 268 meters (880 feet), making it through almost half the 630 meters (2,067 feet) of earth and rock that separate the 33 trapped miners from freedom and their loved ones.

At the present rate the driller would reach the miners as early as Sunday or Monday, but lead engineer Andres Sougarret cautioned that this “is only the first stage.”

A wider drill bit must then be attached before the whole process is repeated in order to make a hole big enough to lower a special cage to pull up the workers one by one.

Despite the caution of officials, who are loath to sell false hope to the families of the 32 Chileans and one Bolivian trapped below, the Schramm T-130 appears to be surpassing all expectations so far.

In just 48 hours it went deeper than the Strata 950 machine working on the “Plan A” tunnel and which has only managed 141 meters (463 feet) in nine days.

A convoy of trucks bearing a third drilling machine that will allow rescuers to put into action “Plan C” was due to begin arriving at the San Jose mine, near Copiapo, later Wednesday, Sougarret said.

President Sebastian Pinera has expressed hope the massive oil drilling machine, which requires a football pitch-sized base to be set up, can begin work by September 18, Chile’’s Independence Day.