Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mansur was killed in an air-strike on Saturday in Pakistan confirmed the USA and the Afghanistan governments on Monday, according to media reports.
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PPP Vice President Senator Sherry Rehman called for a careful recalibration of Pakistan’s national security and foreign policy here today, asking the government to explain the delay by the Foreign Office to put out a clear statement on Pakistan’s position and the breach of sovereignty in a drone strike that allegedly killed Mullah Mansour.
In July 2015 Pakistan hosted direct talks between Afghan and Taliban leaders, with support from China and the United States, but they collapsed after Mullah Omar’s death was revealed.
“The Taliban should seize the opportunity to pursue the only real path for ending this long conflict – joining the Afghan government in a reconciliation process that leads to lasting peace and stability”, he said.
As the search for his successor begins, Pakistan and the United States have continued to encourage the Taliban to engage in peace talks with the Afghan government.
However, speaking at a news conference in Myanmar, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said that the USA government had informed the Pakistan government of the strike.
“We will work on shared objectives with Pakistan, where terrorists that threaten all our nations must be denied safe haven”, he said.
Analysts say he was consolidating his power over the movement by bringing in a son and a brother of his predecessor and by launching large scale attacks on Afghan security forces. It is unclear who will succeed Mansour.
The top commander of USA forces in the Middle East says the killing of the Taliban’s supreme leader presents a hard dilemma for the militants in Afghanistan. In addition to that, the statement stopped short of officially claiming Mansour’s death on Pakistani soil, by stating that authorities are collecting evidence to verify the claims by Washington and Kabul.
Mansour was named as the Taliban’s new leader only previous year after the group confirmed the demise of Mullah Mohammad Omar, who died in 2013.
It is not known if there is someone ready to take over Mansour’s place and lead the group, but senior members of the Taliban met on Monday to discuss plans, according to Reuters.
But US officials held back from confirming that the Taliban leader had been killed in the attack until intelligence had been fully assessed.
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Sirajuddin Haqqani became one of two deputy Taliban commanders previous year, integrating his feared militant faction, known as the Haqqani network, closely into the Afghan Taliban insurgency.
