Ilyas Kashmiri killed,26/11 co-conspirator,US drone attack,Pak,Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami chief
Ilyas Kashmiri killed,26/11 co-conspirator,US drone attack,Pak,Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami chiefA month after Osama bin Laden was gunned down by the United States commandos in Abbottabad, Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HuJI) chief Ilyas Kashmiri was killed in a US drone attack in Pakistan's South Waziristan area on Saturday. Abu Hanzla, the spokesperson of HUJI, a terrorist group affiliated to Al Qaeda, confirmed Kashmiri's death in a letter that was sent to the local media on Saturday. Pakistan's state-run channel PTV also quoted government officials who said nine militants including Ilyas Kashmiri were killed and 22 were injured in the US drone strike. Witnesses said he had arrived in South Waziristan from the Khyber tribal region.
Kashmiri, who was on the US list of the top five terrorist leaders, was considered to be one of the most dangerous terror leaders in the world. He is named in the Mumbai terror attack case against Pakistani Canadian accused Tahawwur Hussain Rana and a senior US official described him as a rising star in Al Qaeda. Rana, who is accused of providing material support to terror outfit Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and providing a cover to Pakistani-American David Coleman Headley for scouting targets for the 2008 Mumbai terror attack, has gone on trial in Chicago.
Although the attacks on European cities never came off, Kashmiri had told an Asian Times reporter that the 2008 Mumbai attack was "nothing compared to what has already been planned for the future". Before joining HuJI he served as a commando in a Special Services Group of the Pakistani Army that was once training Afghan mujahideen to fight the Soviets.
