In Afghanistan, as a result of a CIA counter-terrorist operation, the leader of Al-Qaeda, Ayman al-Zawahiri, was killed.
This was reported to Reuters by US officials.
Zawahiri, an Egyptian physician and surgeon, helped coordinate the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, when about three thousand people died. Along with other high-ranking al-Qaeda members, he also planned the October 12, 2000, attack on a U.S. Navy ship in Yemen that killed 17 U.S. sailors and injured more than 30. The States also indicted him for his involvement in the August 7, 1998, bombings of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, which killed 224 people and injured more than 5,000. Al Zawahiri became the leader of al-Qaeda after Osama bin Laden was killed in Pakistan in 2011.
Ayman al-Zawahiri (right) and Osama bin Laden (left) give an interview, 2001.
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One of the official sources of the USA told journalists on the condition of anonymity that on August 31, the CIA struck the Afghan capital of Kabul with a drone: the operation was successful, there were no victims among the civilian population.
In a statement, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid confirmed the strike and strongly condemned it, calling it a violation of "international principles."
"A rocket hit a house in Sherpur district. There were no casualties, as the house was empty," said Abdul Nafi Thakor, the representative of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Afghanistan.
- Al-Qaeda is an international terrorist Sunni jihadist organization. Founded in 1988 by Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan to fight the Soviet invasion. After the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan, al-Qaeda focused on the United States as an "evil empire", the Western world with its way of life and culture, and its supporters in Islamic countries. The organization aims to create a "Great Islamic Caliphate".