MALALA ATTACKER WAS MILITANT GROUP GUNMAN
THE president of Afghanistan Ashraf Ghani confirmed last Friday (15) that Pakistani Taliban chief Maulana Fazlullah had been killed in a US drone strike.
Fazlullah is believed to have ordered the failed 2012 assassination of Malala Yousafzai, the student activist who became a global symbol of the fight for girls’ rights to schooling. She later won the Nobel Peace Prize.
US forces targeted Fazlullah in a counter-terrorism strike last Thursday (14) in eastern Kunar province, close to the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan, US officials said.
“I spoke with prime minister of #Pakistan Nasir ul Mulk and chief of army staff General Qamar Javed Bajwa and confirmed the death of Mullah Fazlullah,” Ghani tweeted, adding: “His death is the result of tireless human intel led by #Afghan security agencies.”
Ghani added the Pakistani leaders had assured him the strike was “a great step toward building trust between the two nations,” while urging them to “bring (the) Afghan Taliban residing in Pakistan to the negotiation table”.
Pakistan has long been accused of supporting the Afghan Taliban and providing safe haven to its leaders, charges Islamabad denies. Pakistan, in return, has accused Afghanistan of sheltering the Pakistani Taliban.
The Pakistani army called Fazlullah’s apparent death a “positive development”.
Fazlullah’s group – Tehreek-e- Taliban Pakistan (TTP) – was behind the massacre of more than 150 people at a Peshawar school in December 2014, and the death of nine in another attack in December 2017 in the same city.
He went into hiding in Afghanistan in 2009. His death “gives relief to scores of Pakistani families who fell victims to TTP terror including the (school) massacre,” the Pakistani army statement added.
But the Pentagon would not confirm Fazlullah’s death, saying it can take time to gather definitive proof.
Top militant leaders have been reported dead before, only to later resurface.
“We targeted (Fazlullah) but we’re not ready to call jackpot yet,” a US defense official said.
As a schoolgirl, Yousafzai was an activist who chronicled her life under the Taliban. She became a global symbol for human rights after a gunman boarded her school van on October 9, 2012, asked “Who is Malala?” and shot her.
The Pakistani Taliban accused her of “anti-Islamic” activities and of “smearing” the militant group in statements after the attack.
Yousafzai was treated for her injuries in Birmingham, England, where she also completed her schooling. She is currently a student at Oxford University. (AFP)
