This was contained in the Pakistani media report on Monday.
A top commander of the outlawed Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) Omar Khalid Khorasani and three other top militant leaders have been killed in a mysterious blast in eastern Afghanistan's Paktika province.
This was contained in the Pakistani media report on Monday.
The Express Tribune newspaper reports that a vehicle carrying senior commanders of the militant group, including Khorasani, was on Sunday targeted with a mysterious explosive device, according to Afghan officials and local sources.
The militants were travelling in the Birmal district of the province for a meeting when their vehicle hit a roadside mine, the report said.
A senior Afghan official said that all aboard the vehicle, also carrying other TTP commanders- Abdul Wali Mohmand, Mufti Hassan, and Hafiz Dawlat Khan, were killed in the explosion.
The U.S. State Department had Mohmand on its wanted list and had offered a bounty of up to $3 million for information on his whereabouts.
Khorasani, who belonged to the Mohmand tribal district, was considered a top member of the TTP.
Hafiz Dawlat from the Orakzai tribal district was an important member of the group and a close trustee of Khorasani, while Mufti Hassan hailed from the Malakand division and pledged allegiance to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the deceased leader of the Islamic State terrorist organisation.
Also killed in a landmine blast was TTP intelligence chief, Abdul Rashid alias Uqabi Bajauri, according to local Afghan sources.
The TTP is yet to confirm these targeted killings of its top commanders, an incident that would certainly undermine the Afghan Taliban-brokered peace negotiations between the TTP and the Pakistan government.
The news comes after the outlawed group and Pakistan reached a deadlock during their talks as the outfit refused to budge from its demand for the reversal of the merger of the erstwhile Federally Administered Tribal Areas with the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan, the report said.
According to Counter-Terrorism Guide, TTP is an alliance of militant networks formed in 2007 to unify opposition against the Pakistani military.
TTP’s stated objectives are the expulsion of Islamabad’s influence in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas and neighbouring Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province in Pakistan, the implementation of a strict interpretation of sharia throughout Pakistan, and the expulsion of Coalition troops from Afghanistan.
TTP leaders also publicly say that the group seeks to establish an Islamic caliphate in Pakistan that would require the overthrow of the Pakistani Government. TTP historically maintained close ties to senior al-Qa‘ida leaders, including al-Qa‘ida’s former head of operations for Pakistan.