WASHINGTON: The ISIS leader in Afghanistan and Pakistan, Hafiz Saeed, was killed in July in a strike in the border region between the two countries, a US defense official said Friday.
“They got him,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity ahead of any official announcement.
Details of the strike were not immediately available, but a US official told the BBC that Saeed was killed in a July 26 drone strike in the Kot district of Nangarhar.
The death of Saeed represents a major setback for the ISIS group as it tries to establish itself as a serious force in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Afghan authorities erroneously believed Saeed had been killed in another strike in July 2015, when a US drone targeted dozens of ISIS-linked cadres in restive Nangarhar province, close to the Pakistani border.
That attack came less than six months after another strike in Afghanistan killed Abdul Rauf Khadim, who was thought to be the ISIS number two in the country.
Saeed was named head of ISIS’s “Khorasan province,” which includes Afghanistan, Pakistan and parts of neighboring countries, early last year when a group of Pakistani Taliban switched allegiance to the jihadist group.
(Sourced from agencies, Feature image courtesy:oneindia.com)
