Athar Hussain / Reuters
Men try to move sacks of onions to a safer place during a fire in a wholesale vegetable and fruit market, in the outskirts of Karachi on March 6, 2013. A fire broke out in the market Wednesday evening, causing massive damage but no casualties were reported, according to local media.
Akhtar Soomro / Reuters
Firefighters spray water to control a fire after a bomb blast in a residential area of Karachi, Pakistan, March 3. The attack in a Shiite Muslim area killed at least 38 people and wounded dozens.
Azhar Iqbal, a local police official, told the AP that a bomb appeared to have been rigged to a motorcycle and that the damage indicated there could have been additional explosives at the scene. Iqbal said several nearby buildings caught on fire. Published reports have indicated women and children were among the dead.
Read the full story here.
Fareed Khan / AP
A rickshaw driver, his vehicle adorned with a message of peace, makes his way through the slums of Karachi, Pakistan on Feb. 2, 2013.
By Sebastian Abbot, The Associated Press
Published at 5:23 a.m. ET: KARACHI, Pakistan — Pakistani youth leader Syed Ali Abbas Zaidi has a plan to counter the relentless message of violence spewed forth by radical Islamic groups in his country — and he is stealing a gimmick from the hard-liners' own playbook to do it.
His weapon: the three-wheeled motorized rickshaws that buzz along Pakistan's streets carrying paying customers.
Fareed Khan / AP
Artists prepare colorful panels for rickshaws in Karachi on Feb. 2, 2013.
Radical Islamists have long used the rickshaws as a canvas to display slogans in support of religious warfare in neighboring India and Afghanistan and to foster hatred against the United States.
Zaidi is turning that strategy on its head with a fleet of rickshaws emblazoned with peace slogans and decorated with colorful designs similar to those found on many trucks and buses in the country. Read the full story.
A Pakistani youth group is taking on propaganda from radical groups by decorating rickshaws with messages promoting peace. NBCNews.com's Alex Witt reports.
Reuters
A bus is seen in flames at the site of a bomb explosion in Karachi, Pakistan, Dec. 29. Six people were killed and 48 wounded, police and a hospital official said.
Shakil Adil / AP
A Pakistani woman grieves after losing her son in the blast.
Pakistan's commercial capital and biggest city has seen numerous militant attacks over the past 10 years and is also plagued by violence between rival ethnic-based factions.
-- Reported by Reuters
Reuters
People carry an injured man away from the scene of a bomb explosion.
Akhtar Soomro / Reuters
Firefighters douse a bus after a bomb explosion in Karachi.
Akhtar Soomro / Reuters
Journalists from a local television channel stand on a water tanker as they report on the burning chemical warehouse of a plastic bag manufacturing factory in Karachi, Oct. 28.
Asif Hassan / AFP - Getty Images
A Pakistani man mourns as he waits in the EDHI Morgue to identify his relative who was killed in a garment factory fire in Karachi.
Athar Hussain / Reuters
Relatives and residents carry the coffin of a woman, who was killed in a fire at a garment factory, for burial during her funeral in Karachi on Sept. 13.
Fareed Khan / AP
People comfort a woman who lost a family member in a garment factory fire, during a funeral in Karachi, Pakistan on Sept. 13.
Shakil / AP
Maryam Aslam weeps while enquiring about her missing brother who worked in a garment factory, in Karachi. Pakistani officials say the death toll from devastating factory fires that broke out in two major cities has killed hundreds.
Two separate blazes in Pakistan broke out Tuesday night, one at a garment factory in the southern port city of Karachi and another at a shoe manufacturer in the eastern city of Lahore.
Pakistan registered murder charges against factory bosses and government officials over the deaths of the more than 289 people in the country's worst industrial disaster, police said.
EPA
People survey the undamaged area of a garment factory which was hit by a fire in Karachi on Sept. 13. The devastating fire on Sept. 11 in Pakistan's commercial hub of Karachi killed at least 280 people, as the deadly blaze raised fresh concerns about workplace safety.
Asif Hassan / AFP - Getty Images
The hand of dead Pakistani garment factory worker is seen at a hospital following a fire in a garment factory in which at least 280 people died in Karachi. More than 310 people have perished in fires that gutted factories in Pakistan's two largest cities, in tragedies that prompted calls for an overhaul of poor industrial safety standards, officials said.
Asif Hassan / AFP - Getty Images
A Pakistani man weeps for his relative who was killed in a garment factory fire in Karachi on September 13, 2012.
Fareed Khan / AP
A woman mourns the death of a family member outside a mortuary in Karachi, Pakistan, on September 12, 2012. Flames raced through a garment factory in the city on Tuesday night, killing at least 100 people.
Asif Hassan / AFP - Getty Images
Locals watch the rescue operation outside the burnt garment factory in Karachi on September 12, 2012.
By NBC News staff and wire reports — At least 261 people burnt to death as fires swept through two factories in Pakistan, police and government officials said on Wednesday, raising questions about industrial safety in the nuclear-armed South Asian nation.
Slideshow: A nation in turmoil
Flames raced through a garment factory in the teeming commercial capital of Karachi, killing 236 people. Weeping relatives in hospitals and morgues heaped criticism on the deeply unpopular government. In Lahore, a fire raged in a shoe factory, killing at least 25 people. Read the full story.
Fareed Khan / AP
A woman looks for a missing family member at a morgue in Karachi on September 12, 2012.
Athar Hussain / Reuters
Relatives mourn their loved ones, who were killed in a fire at a garment factory, after their bodies were brought to the Jinnah hospital morgue in Karachi on September 12, 2012.
Arif Ali / AFP - Getty Images
Rescuers collect evidence in a shoe-making factory following a fire which gutted the factory the previous night in Lahore, Pakistan on September 12, 2012.
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Akhtar Soomro / Reuters
Eight-year-old Fareeha swings a hammock with her feet, to comfort her brother, while selling plastic balloons along a sidewalk in Karachi, Pakistan on Aug. 2, 2012.
Rehan Khan / EPA
Pakistani security officials in civilian clothing take position following an operation against alleged criminals in restive Lyari area of southern port city of Karachi on April 27, 2012.
Pakistani police mounted an operation against alleged criminals in a restive district of Karachi on Friday, EPA reports. The Lyari area has been the site of a gang war that has cost many lives in recent years.
Pakistan's Express Tribune reported that police were targeted with rockets and hand grenades during the operation, and that three people including two policemen had been killed.
Rehan Khan / EPA
A woman cries as security officials take up positions following an operation against alleged criminals in the restive Lyari area of Karachi on April 27, 2012.
Rehan Khan / EPA
People stand outside their house during the police operation in Lyari, Karachi, on April 27, 2012.
Mohammad Sajjad / AP
Images of daily life, political pursuits, religious rites and deadly violence.
Remember the shark the size of a school bus that starred on PhotoBlog Tuesday? Well, it's back... and it's causing a stir.
Fareed Khan / AP
Visitors surround the carcass of a whale shark in Karachi, Pakistan, on Feb 9, 2012. People crowded around to put their hands on the massive shark, and families snapped their picture with it — ignoring the pungent smell as it began to rot.
Ashraf Khan of The Associated Press takes up the story:
KARACHI, Pakistan — Qasim Khan waged the unlikeliest of battles with Pakistani authorities Thursday over the right to charge hundreds of curious visitors 20 rupees (22 cents) each to see a roughly 40-foot whale shark he bought from a fisherman.
Khan is in the business of buying fish, albeit usually much smaller ones, and jumped at the chance on Tuesday to pay about $2,200 for the 20-ton behemoth, which was discovered dead in the Arabian Sea off the southern Pakistani city of Karachi.
Business was brisk Wednesday, as several thousand people paid to see the brown and white-spotted shark, which Khan set up under a cloth tent next to the harbor.
But police cracked down Thursday, saying fishery authorities had decided people should be allowed to see the shark for free. Khan resisted and hid his prize attraction under the giant piece of green cloth he had previously used as a tent.
Fareed Khan / AP
A boy peeks inside a tent where the carcass was being kept. One visitor, 9-year-old Fizza Umar, said "It was so huge! I wish I could take it home."
Shakil Adil / AP
A man sells tickets to people eager to see the shark.
The move sparked a comic game of cat and mouse between Khan and the police. They would order him to remove the cover, which he would do briefly before replacing it. Then the cycle would start over again.
Khan countered by saying he paid 200,000 rupees for it. "To recover my cost I am charging just 20 rupees per ticket, but the forsaken fishery authorities have deprived me of this fortune," he said. Read the full story.
Fareed Khan / AP
Some in the crowd were upset to see people climbing all over the shark. "This is sheer disrespect for animals," said 20-year-old nursing student Usman Zada.
Fishermen in the Pakistani port of Karachi got more than they bargained for Tuesday as they reeled in one of the biggest fish in the sea: a whale shark.
The Express Tribune, a Pakistani newspaper, reported that the 40-foot fish was first spotted ten days ago in seas about 150 km (93 miles) from the city. Mehmood Khan, the owner of a local fishery, said the shark was unconscious at that time and other reports said that it was found dead Tuesday.
A large crowd gathered as a succession of cranes were brought in to lift the shark on to the pier. After several hours and a number of failed attempts, the leviathan was finally brought ashore and promptly sold for 1.7m Rupees ($18,750).
The whale shark was added to the World Conservation Union's list of threatened species in 2008.
Rehan Khan / EPA
Fishermen tie ropes around the carcass of a whale shark in a harbor in Karachi, Pakistan, on Feb. 7, 2012. The 40-foot whale shark was said to have been found dead in the Arabian Sea.
Asif Hassan / AFP - Getty Images
Cranes pull the carcass of the whale shark from the water on Feb. 7, 2012.
Asif Hassan / AFP - Getty Images
Curious onlookers crowd around the carcass after it was lifted out of the water on Feb. 7, 2012.
Find out what happened to the shark next in this update: Pakistani man fights police over 40-foot shark.
Athar Hussain / Reuters
Eight-year-old Sumayya, whose uncle, Imran Ali, was injured in a shootout by unidentified gunmen, looks at him as he is brought to a hospital for treatment in Karachi, Pakistan, on August 23.
Athar Hussain / Reuters
A man rides a donkey-cart on the deserted streets during a strike in Karachi on August 23. Karachi faced a complete shutdown on Tuesday after the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) announced that a day of mourning would be observed against the ongoing wave of violence that has claimed nearly 100 lives in less than a week, local media reported.
Karachi, a city of 18 million people, ground to a halt Tuesday, with most residents staying off the streets after a political party called a strike to protest the deaths of at least 96 people killed in the past week, the AP reported.
Yet the violence shows few signs of abating. Police chief Saud Mirza told the AP that the bodies of 10 more people were found overnight, some of them stuffed in bloody sacks. Read the full story.
Also on PhotoBlog: August 18 - Wave of violence in Karachi kills 39 in two days.
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