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Taliban leader killed in raid

QUETTA: Pakistani security forces killed a top figure in the Taliban militia fighting U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, and captured four other militants Monday, said a military official.

Mansoor Dadullah, brother of the slain Taliban military commander Mullah Dadullah, was among five militants captured after a shootout near a seminary in Zhob district of southwestern Baluchistan province around 10 a.m., a local intelligence official told The Associated Press.

A senior military official said Dadullah died of his wounds while being flown to a hospital with the other four injured men.

Dadullah’s death comes amid growing Western pressure on Pakistan to crack down on Islamist militants launching attacks inside Afghanistan but increasingly destabilising Pakistan itself.

Dadullah rose in the militia’s ranks as an important commander in southern Afghanistan after his brother was killed during a military operation in Afghanistan’s Helmand province in May. Mullah Dadullah was the highest-ranking Taliban commander killed since the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.

But in late December, Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid announced that Mansoor Dadullah had been dismissed from the movement for “disobeying orders” and conducting activities “against the Taliban’s rules and regulations.”

On Monday, Mujahid said Dadullah was still part of the Taliban movement, but that he was no longer an operational commander in southern Afghanistan. Mujahid said he had no comment to make about Dadullah’s reported capture and death.

Dadullah told the AP in a phone interview in January that he remained a Taliban commander and had asked the militia’s supreme leader Mullah Omar to dispel “rumours” of his dismissal.

He also claimed that he had met Al-Qaeda’s No. 2 Ayman al-Zawahri a few months ago but had never met Osama bin Laden. He said the Taliban and the Al-Qaeda fighters in Helmand were fighting alongside each other.

The operation was carried out in the Gwal Ismailzai village, 240 km northeast of the Baluchistan capital, Quetta, by a joint force of police, anti-terrorism forces and army commandos. — AP

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