JuA Chief Umar Khalid Khurasani ‘critically’ injured in drone strike: sources

PESHAWAR: The chief of proscribed militant outfit Jamaat-ul-Ahrar (JuA) has been ‘critically’ injured in a US drone strike in Paktia province of Afghanistan, sources said Tuesday.

The sources told Geo News that Umar Khalid Khurasani was injured in the drone strike conducted close to the Pak-Afghan border in Paktia on Tuesday.

Khalid Khurasani alias Abdul Wali was shifted to undisclosed location after being hit by drone strike, they said.

Khurasani hails from Mohmand Agency - one of the seven agencies in Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA).

Two suspected U.S. drone strikes on Tuesday killed 11 people on the mountainous Pakistan-Afghanistan border, following a strike a day earlier that killed 20, government and militant sources said.

“Four unmanned drones fired six missiles in Monday’s attack, and four more were dropped in two strikes on Tuesday,” Baseer Khan Wazir, the top administrative official in the Kurram Agency, part of Pakistan’s restive Federally Administered Tribal Areas, told Reuters.

The drones fired missiles on militant hideouts, killing at least 31 people over two days, he added, with all three attacks taking place on the Afghan side.

“Twenty people were killed yesterday, mostly from the Afghan Taliban, and 11 more were killed in today’s attacks,” Wazir told Reuters.

Taliban sources said 18 members of the Haqqani militants, allied to the Taliban, were killed in Monday’s strike and six in one of Tuesday’s attacks.

“There were some mud-built houses which were being used by the mujahideen (Afghan Taliban fighters),” said a member of the Afghan Taliban, who asked not to be identified.

No prominent militants were in the area when the drones targeted two or three different compounds, he added.

Another Taliban source said two commanders were killed in Monday’s attack, however.