Senior Qaeda figure killed in drone strike
21 January, 2012
WASHINGTON/ ISLAMABAD: A terrorist who acted as a senior operations organiser for al Qaeda was targeted and killed in one of two US drone strikes launched against targets inside Pakistan last week, a US official said. US and Pakistani sources told Reuters that the target of the attack was Aslam Awan, a Pakistani national from Abbottabad. They said he was targeted in a strike by a US-operated drone on January 10, directed at what news reports said was a compound near the town of Miranshah. The sources described Awan, who also was known by the nom-de-guerre Abdullah Khorasani, as a significant figure in the remaining core leadership of al Qaeda. Pakistani officials could not confirm that Awan was killed in the drone attack, but the US official said he was. One of the sources described Awan as an associate of al Qaeda's current chief of external operations, whose identity is known to intelligence officials but not to the general public. "Aslam Awan was a senior al Qaeda external operations planner who was working on attacks against the West," a US official said. A Pakistani security source based in the country's border region said that Awan was the remaining member of an al Qaeda cell Pakistani authorities have been trying to roll up since 2008. "We thought he was very close to Ayman al-Zawahiri," the source said, referring to al Qaeda's current leader and bin Laden's long-time deputy. End.
|
