Kabul, Afghanistan – One of the Taliban’s top commanders, a financial and logistics expert with ties to al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, was killed last week in an airstrike in the lawless Afghan desert near the Pakistan border, the U.S. military announced Saturday.
Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Osmani, the highest-ranking Taliban member killed since the harsh regime was driven out in late 2001, had been under surveillance for several days, said Col. Tom Collins, a U.S. military spokesman.
Osmani was killed Tuesday while riding in a vehicle near the border town of Baramcha in Helmand province, known as a center for drug runners and insurgents, Afghan officials said.
“He was very, very important for the Taliban,” said Asadullah Wafa, who started as the governor of Helmand province Saturday. “He was in charge of all of southern Afghanistan. It will definitely weaken the Taliban’s power in Afghanistan.”
The Taliban denied that Osmani had been killed, but Collins said his death had been verified.
The announcement led many Afghans to hope for some relief from the worsening violence.
The past year of the war in Afghanistan has been the deadliest since 2001, with 4,000 casualties.
Osmani was known as a key member of the Taliban’s leadership, responsible for everything from gathering money to training suicide bombers. He frequently moved across the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan, where Taliban commanders reportedly find shelter.
As the military corps commander in the Taliban stronghold of Kandahar during the Taliban regime, Osmani was considered to be a potential successor to Mullah Mohammed Omar, the elusive Taliban leader thought to be hiding in Pakistan.
“He was the biggest leader of the Taliban after Mullah Omar,” said Dad Mohammad Khan, a parliament member from Helmand province who blames the Taliban for killing 48 members of his family in June. “The effect of his death will not only be in Helmand, but all over Afghanistan. It means we are now safe from the danger of the devil.”
