Reports Say: Is One Less Threat In Pakistan After U.S. Drone Stike Takes Down The Taliban Leader
The Pakistan Taliban leader was reportedly killed in an American drone strike on his known terrorist compound. The same leader who was responsible for the murders of more than a hundred children and attacking U.S. targets in the region.
According to PJ Media, Mullah Fazlullah Khorasani, the leader of the Pakistani Taliban, was killed in a U.S. drone strike, according to an Afghan official.
Khorasani was blamed for the vicious attack on a school in Peshawar in 2014 that killed 132 children. His headquarters was just over the border with Afghanistan in Kunar.
A U.S. spokesman confirmed that a drone strike “targeted a senior leader of a designated terrorist organization.”
As Written By NBC News:
Afghan Defense Ministry spokesman Mohammad Radmanish told NBC News that Fazlullah died in a strike in the Marawaya district of the border province of Kunar.
Earlier, Lt. Col Martin O’Donnell, a spokesman for U.S. Forces in Afghanistan, said in a statement that U.S. forces had carried out an airstrike Thursday in Kunar “which targeted a senior leader of a designated terrorist organization.”
Fazlullah’s death could ease strained ties between Islamabad and Washington even as Afghanistan observes an unprecedented three-day ceasefire with the larger Afghan Taliban.
What his death will mean for the Pakistani Taliban is unclear, but Al Jazeera’s Kamal Hyder, reporting from the Pakistani capital of Islamabad, said the news comes at a time as both Kabul and Islamabad are trying to improve relations.
“Pakistan had already complained to Afghanistan that Fazlullah was operating from Afghan soil; he was able to move from Kunar and Nuristan [province]… Pakistan had demanded from Afghanistan and the US earlier also to target Fazlullah,” Hyder said.
“But indeed once confirmed, this is a huge loss to the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan and of course will be considered a major step for Pakistan improving relations with the United States to an extent and also removing the mistrust with the Afghans.”