Afghan intelligence officials announced the arrest of 15 suspects in connection to the series of suspected poison attacks against girls’ schools in northern Afghanistan. Among those arrested were a Taliban deputy shadow governor and three women.
The airstrike took place in the same district in Wardak province where 38 US and Afghan troops, including Navy SEALs, were killed when their helicopter was shot down in August 2011.
Shabaab emir Sheikh Mukhtar Abu Zubayr’s reward of $7 million puts him at number six on the Rewards for Justice list of wanted terrorists.
The al Qaeda facilitator, who was based in Takhar province, “served as a financier and liaison between al Qaeda leaders,” according to ISAF.
“The agents of Punjab have once again spilled the blood of innocent civilians,” Kandahar’s chief of police said, referring to Pakistan’s influence over the Taliban.
US officials have confirmed that al Libi was killed in yesterday’s drone strike in Mir Ali. Al Qaeda has not confirmed his death.
An audio message from Guantanamo detainee Fayiz al Kandari to the Syrian people was reportedly released online. US officials have identified al Kandari as an al Qaeda propagandist who was close to Osama bin Laden.
Mullah Abdul Salam Zakir, the brother of the former Guantanamo Bay detainee who quickly assumed command of the Afghan Taliban’s military branch, is said to have been killed during a raid in northern Helmand province. ISAF has not confirmed Salam’s death.
The strike in Mir Ali is the third in Pakistan in three days, and the eighth in the two weeks since the US failed to get Pakistan to reopen the supply lines for NATO forces in Afghanistan.
Less than a week after both parties agreed to establish an independent state in northern Mali and implement sharia law, Tuareg rebels have publicly renounced the accord signed with the al Qaeda-affiliated Ansar Dine group.
The drones targeted a group of Taliban and “foreigners” who gathered to note the death of one of Mullah Nazir’s commanders, who was killed in yesterday’s drone strike.
Rahmanullah, “a key commander” for Mullah Nazir, was reported killed in today’s strike. Nazir considers himself an al Qaeda leader.
“Some insurgents were able to get inside the perimeter” of Forward Operating Base Salerno, “but they were neutralized,” a US military spokesman told LWJ.
Homegrown Islamic extremists targeted US military personnel in the northwestern city.
Commander Abbos Mansoor was named the military emir of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan just days before he was killed in a drone strike, while Abdul Aziz served as a combat cameraman and producer for Jundallah Studio.
Hafiz Saeed Khan, the leader of the Movement of the Taliban in Pakistan in Arakzai, said his followers killed or ejected tribal leaders who opposed Taliban rule.
Sakhr al Taifi, a senior leader from Saudi Arabia who communicated with top al Qaeda leaders based in Pakistan, was killed in yesterday’s airstrike in Kunar.
National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA) rebels agreed to merge with the al Qaeda-backed Islamist group Ansar Dine (Defenders of Faith), and declared the creation of an Islamic state in northern Mali.
The strike targeted Kaid al Dhahab, the leader of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula in Baydah province, and his brother Nabil.
Special operations forces launched airstrikes in two districts in an attempt to kill two al Qaeda leaders in the northeastern province.
The drone program will resume, as Pakistan has balked at reopening NATO’s supply lines into Afghanistan, a US intelligence official involved in the program told LWJ.
The American jihadist said the move is necessary to unite the local Islamist insurgencies and global jihadist movements.
The US has struck three times in the past five days in Pakistan’s Taliban-controlled tribal agency of North Waziristan.
The Taliban eulogized Jamil ur Rahman, who was killed in a US airstrike on May 23, and threatened to retaliate.
Badakhshan province has become a haven for the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan.
Today’s designation takes place after the terror group’s emir and top bomb maker were added to the list of global terrorists late last year.
The strike is the second in two days and targeted a compound in an area of North Waziristan known to serve as a nexus for al Qaeda, the Taliban, and other jihadist groups.
Jamil ur Rahman was killed just one week after ISAF captured a liaison to the Peshawar Shura who also served as a facilitator for the Taliban’s shadow governor in Nuristan.
The strike took place near Miramshah, the headquarters of the al Qaeda-linked Haqqani Network.
Afghan intelligence officials announced the latest achievements in thwarting multiple Taliban terror plots, including attacks intended for Kabul, Logar, Kandahar, and Nangarhar provinces.