Sought After Pakistani Taliban Leader Mehsud May Be Dead

The death is unconfirmed, but militants say the Taliban is already holding a "shura" council to select Mehsud's replacement.

Courtesy: globalsecurity.org

(SALEM, Ore.) - Military officials in Pakistan believe Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud may have been killed during a CIA missile strike. Mehsud is a suspect in several attacks in Pakistan including the assassination of Benazir Bhutto.

Pakistani security officials report that Mehsud, his wife and bodyguards were killed on August 5th 2009 when an American drone aircraft attacked the home of Mehsud's father-in-law, in the Zangar area in South Waziristan.

Today during the State Department's press briefing, Deputy Department Spokesman Robert Wood discussed the importance of Mehsud.

"Well, Mehsud has been responsible for a number of atrocious terrorist attacks against people from around the world, frankly. And we will continue to work with other countries around the world to fight the scourge of terrorism."

The unconfirmed death of this Taliban leader would be a boost for Coalition forces, but Wood issued the reminder that this is only one of many individuals western forces are pursuing.

"Mehsud is just one individual who’s been responsible for carrying out heinous acts of terrorism and aggression against innocent civilians, and we will continue to go after those people who countenance those acts."

Wood declined to delve into just what the death of Mehsud represents.

"I don’t want to speculate about what it may or may not mean. But again, this is a long-term struggle that we are in against violent extremism, and we’re going to continue to try to confront that challenge as best we can with our partners around the world. And – but we realize this is going to be a long-term struggle."

Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik is still hesitating to confirm the death of Mehsud. But Kafayat Ullah, a Taliban source, also announced the death of the militant in the strike according to Wikipedia.

Syed Saleem Shahzad, writing in the Asia Times, described Baitullah Mehsud as a physically small man, with diabetes.

It isn't the first time Mehsud has been declared dead. News sources reported Baitullah Mehsud death on September 30th 2008. He was 34 at the time, and sources attributed his death to kidney failure.

Militants report that the Taliban is already holding a "shura" council to select the replacement for Mehsud. The Associated Press reports that the meeting is taking place in "the lawless, rugged South Waziristan tribal region".

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Tim King is a former U.S. Marine with twenty years of experience on the west coast as a television news producer, photojournalist, reporter and assignment editor. In addition to his role as a war correspondent, this Los Angeles native serves as Salem-News.com's Executive News Editor.
Tim spent the winter of 2006/07 covering the war in Afghanistan, and he was in Iraq over the summer of 2008, reporting from the war while embedded with both the U.S. Army and the Marines. Tim holds numerous awards for reporting, photography, writing and editing, including the Oregon AP Award for Spot News Photographer of the Year (2004), the first place Electronic Media Award in Spot News, Las Vegas, (1998), Oregon AP Cooperation Award (1991); and several other awards including the 2005 Red Cross Good Neighborhood Award for reporting. Serving the community in very real terms, Salem-News.com is the nation's only truly independent high traffic news Website, affiliated with Google News and several other major search engines and news aggregators.
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