Washington // ISIL’s leader in Afghanistan and Pakistan, Hafiz Saeed, has been killed in an air strike in Nangarhar province, the Pentagon said.
Saeed was named head of ISIL’s “Khorasan province”, which includes Afghanistan, Pakistan and parts of neighbouring countries, early last year when a group of Pakistani Taliban switched allegiance to the extremist group.
The strike was carried out on July 26 while US and Afghan special operations forces carried out counter-ISIL operations in Achin district in southern Nangarhar province, Pentagon spokesman Gordon Trowbridge said.
Saeed “was known to directly participate in attacks against US and coalition forces, and the actions of his network terrorised Afghans, especially in Nangarhar,” he added.
A US official told the BBC that Saeed was killed by drone.
The death of Saeed represents a major setback for the ISIL group as it tries to establish itself as a serious force in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Afghan authorities erroneously believed Saeed had been killed in another strike in July 2015, when a US drone targeted dozens of ISIL-linked cadres in Nangarhar province, close to the Pakistani border.
That attack came less than six months after another strike in Afghanistan killed Abdul Rauf Khadim, who was thought to be the ISIL number two in the country.
Some Afghan Taliban members have defected to the group, with insurgents apparently adopting the black ISIL flag to rebrand themselves as a more lethal force.
Most Nato combat troops who had been fighting the Taliban and other insurgent groups have now left Afghanistan, with responsibility for the country’s security switching to local forces.
The Afghan troops, however, still rely on US air support and training and have struggled to stem frequent Taliban offensives.
The former Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mansour was killed in a US drone strike inside Pakistan in May.
Both the Pakistani Taliban and ISIL have claimed responsibility for a horrific suicide bombing on Monday at a hospital in Pakistan which killed 73 people.
ISIL has been trying to expand its presence beyond Iraq and Syria, where tens of thousands of militants have been killed in air strikes and offensives, but has made only limited progress.
*Agence France-Presse
