Pakistan united against terror : Nawaz Sharif

ISLAMABAD, Dec 18 (Agencies): Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif said Wednesday that the country is united in the fight against terror, a day after 132 children were killed in a Taliban attack on an army-run school here. All parties in Pakistan are united in fighting terrorism, Nawaz Sharif told the media.

"We should not let the sacrifice of our children go in waste. Talks with Taliban have yielded no results," the prime minister said during the all-party meeting.

The meeting was held to chalk out the plan to eliminate terrorism in Pakistan.

Meanwhile, A Pakistani court Thursday granted bail to the alleged mastermind of the 2008 terror attacks in Mumbai, lawyers told AFP, a move likely to further inflame tensions with India.

The 60-hour siege on India's economic capital left 166 people dead and was blamed on the banned Pakistani militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT).

Relations between the two nuclear-armed rivals worsened dramatically after the carnage, in which 10 gunmen attacked luxury hotels, a popular cafe, a train station and a Jewish centre.

Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, accused of masterminding events, was granted bail by a judge in the capital Islamabad.

"We had moved a bail application with the Islamabad anti-terror court on December 10, today the judge granted bail to my client after hearing arguments from both sides," Lakhvi's lawyer Rizwan Abbasi told AFP.

Prosecutor Mohammad Chaudhry Azhar confirmed the court had granted bail.

The court's decision comes a day after Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif vowed to crack down on terror groups in Pakistan, after Taliban gunmen massacred 148 people at a school.

Sharif on Wednesday announced that a six-year moratorium on the death penalty would be lifted for those convicted of terror offences.

The horror of the Mumbai carnage played out on live television around the world, as commandos battled the heavily-armed gunmen, who arrived by sea on the evening of November 26.