JOIN USUS drone raid may have killed top Haqqani leader
Badruddin Haqqani, the key operational commander of the al-Qaeda linked Haqqani network, and top Pakistani Taliban commander Mullah Dadullah are believed to have been killed in US drone and airstrikes in the tribal region of Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Badruddin, the son of Afghan warlord Jalaluddin Haqqani, is ranked as a deputy to his elder brother and the network’s chief Sirajuddin and was believed to be killed in one of the five volleys of drone strikes in Pakistan’s Taliban-controlled tribal agency of North Waziristan since August 18.
Four of the missiles hit place in Shawal Valley, considered to be traditional area of operations of Haqqani network in North Waziristan, and US reports said he may have been killed in the August 21 strike near Miranshah.
The wave of attacks drew strongest protest from Islamabad in recent years when a senior US diplomat was summoned by the Foreign Ministry to lodge their opposition to the attacks.
Badruddin, thought to be in his mid-30s, was a member of the Miranshah Shura Council, one of the Afghan Taliban’s four regional commands, which controls all activities of the militant group in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Senior US officials were quoted by the New York Times as saying that they had strong indications that Badruddin, the key commander of the Haqqani network which is responsible for most of the spectacular assaults on American bases and Afghan cities in recent years, was killed in a drone airstrike.
Meanwhile, a statement by coalition forces in Afghanistan said that Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) leader Mullah Dadullah was among 20 militants killed in a “precision airstrike in Shigal wa Sheltan district (of) Kunar province on Friday.”
Dadullah, whose real name is Maulana Mohammad Jamaluddin, was made the commander of Taliban in Pakistan’s Bajaur Agency in 2010.
He fled to Afghanistan to escape an operation launched by the Pakistan Army. His deputy Shakir too was killed in the airstrike, the statement said. Badruddin is one of the nine Haqqani family members who have been designated by the US as global terrorists. His brother Sirajuddin is the overall leader of the Miramshah Shura.
Key leader
Giving details about the operation, American intelligence officials indicated to the Long War journal that the remotely piloted Predators and Reapers were targeting an “important Jihadi leader” in the region but his name was not disclosed.
“There are indications that Haqqani has met his demise,” a senior US official said in Washington.
He said officials were waiting to sift through evidence, including information on jihadist websites, before they could be certain that Haqqani had been killed.
In Washington, the White House and the CIA, which carries out drone strikes in Pakistan, declined to comment.
The latest string of drone attacks, most of them carried out in Shawal area of North Waziristan Agency, has renewed tensions between Pakistan and the US.