US drones killed 16 "militants" in a strike today on a compound
in Pakistan's Taliban-infested tribal agency of Arakzai. The strike is
the first recorded outside of Pakistan's tribal agencies of North and
South Waziristan since December 2010.
Pakistani officials told Dawn that the unmanned Predators or Reapers fired four missiles at a compound in the Buland Khel area of Arakzai. The compound belonged to Maulana Shakirullah, "who is the commander of the Hafiz Gul Bahadar group of the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP or Movement of the Taliban in Pakistan)," officials told the Pakistani news agency. However, Bahadur operates independently of the Movement of the Taliban in Pakistan.
Shakirullah is said to be allied with the Haqqani Network and al Qaeda. No senior al Qaeda or allied jihadist commanders from foreign terrorist groups are reported to have been killed in the strike.
Drone strikes outside of the designated "kill boxes" in North and South Waziristan are rare. Of the 318 drone strikes recorded by The Long War Journal since 2004, only 17 have taken place outside of North and South Waziristan.
Today's strike is the first that has been reported outside of North and South Waziristan since the US hit training camps belonging to Taliban commander Tariq Afridi in the tribal agency of Khyber in four strikes on Dec. 16 and Dec. 17 in 2010.
The US has conducted only one strike in Arakzai in the past, on April 1, 2009. In that strike, which targeted a Taliban compound in the town of Khadzai, a region run by Hakeemullah Mehsud, the emir of the al Qaeda-linked Movement of the Taliban in Pakistan, 12 Taliban fighters and al Qaeda operatives were killed and 12 more were wounded. Hakeemullah was thought to be attending a senior Taliban leadership meeting at the compound, but was not killed in the strike. Abdullah Hamas al Filistini, a senior al Qaeda trainer, was among those killed in the April 1 strike.
Pakistani officials told Dawn that the unmanned Predators or Reapers fired four missiles at a compound in the Buland Khel area of Arakzai. The compound belonged to Maulana Shakirullah, "who is the commander of the Hafiz Gul Bahadar group of the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP or Movement of the Taliban in Pakistan)," officials told the Pakistani news agency. However, Bahadur operates independently of the Movement of the Taliban in Pakistan.
Shakirullah is said to be allied with the Haqqani Network and al Qaeda. No senior al Qaeda or allied jihadist commanders from foreign terrorist groups are reported to have been killed in the strike.
Drone strikes outside of the designated "kill boxes" in North and South Waziristan are rare. Of the 318 drone strikes recorded by The Long War Journal since 2004, only 17 have taken place outside of North and South Waziristan.
Today's strike is the first that has been reported outside of North and South Waziristan since the US hit training camps belonging to Taliban commander Tariq Afridi in the tribal agency of Khyber in four strikes on Dec. 16 and Dec. 17 in 2010.
The US has conducted only one strike in Arakzai in the past, on April 1, 2009. In that strike, which targeted a Taliban compound in the town of Khadzai, a region run by Hakeemullah Mehsud, the emir of the al Qaeda-linked Movement of the Taliban in Pakistan, 12 Taliban fighters and al Qaeda operatives were killed and 12 more were wounded. Hakeemullah was thought to be attending a senior Taliban leadership meeting at the compound, but was not killed in the strike. Abdullah Hamas al Filistini, a senior al Qaeda trainer, was among those killed in the April 1 strike.
Read more: http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2012/10/us_drones_kil_16_mil.php#ixzz291PrKyb0
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