“Mansour rejected efforts by the Afghan government to seriously engage in peace talks and end the violence that has taken the lives of countless innocent Afghan men, women and children”, Obama continued in the statement. “We’ve encouraged that. We support an Afghan-owned, Afghan led process”, he said.
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First, the United States succeeded in killing a Taliban leader, perhaps tops on the “kill” list, with no loss of US forces, the usual rationale for killings by drone.
“It’s at least equally likely that killing Mansour will destroy any chance to get the Taliban into negotiations with the (Afghan) government, not that there ever was much of one”, said the second official, who specializes in South Asia and also spoke on the condition of anonymity.
“This is not a change in authorities at all, this is us continuing what we’ve been doing, which is conducting strikes of a defensive nature”, Davis said.
Further, Toner said that the death of Mansour does not mean defeat of the Taliban but it does send a clear message.
The president authorised the drone strike that killed Mansour in a remote region just on the Pakistani side of the border with Afghanistan on Saturday.
As always, there is also a controversy over the way the Taliban leader has been targeted especially through a drone strike inside Pakistan, which is considered to be a clear violation of sovereignty of the country.
Reaction from Islamabad was otherwise relatively muted, and a number of questions remained over what happened.
“The relevant officials at the Islamic Republic deny that this person on this date crossed into Pakistan from Iran’s border”, said Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hossein Jaberi Ansari.
Even if it were possible to persuade the Taliban that the Afghan government was not aware of the US intention to kill Mr. Mansour, his assassination could not be considered exactly a confidence-building measure in that context.
Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (JUI-S) chief Maulana Samiul Haq Monday said that Afghan Taliban chief Mullah Akhtar Mansour had already chosen commander Haibatullah and Sirajuddin Haqqani as his successors after his death.
Yaqoob initially opposed Mansour’s claim to the leadership when his father’s death was belatedly made public a year ago.
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Senior members confirmed that their main shura, or leadership council, has been meeting to discuss the succession in a bid to prevent factional splits from fragmenting the movement.
