Top Taliban leader shot dead near Islamabad

A Senior leader of the Taliban-linked Haqqani network militant group has been shot and killed in Pakistan, intelligence officials say.

Pakistani intelligence officials said Nasiruddin Haqqani, the elder brother of Sirajuddin Haqqani, who has run the cross-border militant outfit, was killed near Islamabad during the weekend.

Sources say his body has been taken for burial to Miranshah, the main town of North Waziristan tribal region.

“His funeral was held today at 3:30 p.m. at the Haqqania Madrassah (seminary) in Miramshah,” media outlets quoted a senior Taliban commander as saying.

However, some reports say the top militant leader was killed in a series of violent clashes in an Afghan area close to Pakistan.

The assassination comes days after a US drone strike killed Pakistani Taliban chief, Hakimullah Mehsud, along with four other people in Pakistan’s troubled northwest.

The Haqqani militant network, which has links to al-Qaeda, has carried out a string of deadly attacks across Pakistan and neighboring Afghanistan.

There has been a surge in the number of militants’ assaults against Afghan forces, foreign troops, and civilians in the war-torn country in recent months with US-led troops and Afghan forces falling prey to Taliban attacks on an almost daily basis.

Pro-Taliban militants have also increased their attacks across Pakistan since Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif came to power in May.