PESHAWAR, Pakistan — The leader of the Pakistani Taliban was killed by a U.S. drone strike, an Afghan official said Friday. Mullah Fazlullah Khorasani was Pakistan's most-wanted militant and blamed for attacks including a 2014 school massacre that killed 132 children and the 2012 shooting of schoolgirl Malala Yousafzai, who was later awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. In March, the U.S. offered a $5 million reward for information on Fazlullah. Afghan Defense Ministry spokesman Mohammad Radmanish told NBC News that Fazlullah died in a strike in the Marawaya district of the border province of Kunar. Earlier, Lt. Col Martin O’Donnell, a spokesman for U.S. Forces in Afghanistan, said in a statement that U.S. forces had carried out an airstrike Thursday in Kunar "which targeted a senior leader of a designated terrorist organization." The Kunar river in Afghanistan's Kunar province. John Moore / Getty Images file Fazlullah's death could ease strained ties between Islamabad and Washington even as Afghanistan observes an unprecedented three-day ceasefire with the larger Afghan Taliban. Pakistan is considered key to persuading Afghan Taliban leaders, who Washington believes shelter on Pakistani soil, to open negotiations to end the 17-year-old war in Afghanistan. Prior to the Afghan Defense Ministry stating that Fazlullah had been killed, several members of the Pakistani Taliban told NBC News they had been unable to make contact with him and other senior commanders since receiving word of the strike. They said they feared four other top commanders may also have been killed. "Most of our people are seriously concerned ‎after they heard about the killing of our leader, but the top leadership is out of access," Pakistani Taliban commander Maulvi Obaidur Rahman told NBC News. Like many other Pakistani militants, Khorasani had crossed into Afghanistan after the Pakistani army launched a major military offensive in the Swat Valley in 2009. Mushtaq Yusufzai reported from Peshawar, Francis Whittaker from London, and Ahmed Mengli from Kabul.<doc-sep>A burnt-out police pick-up truck stands in the street after Afghan security forces retook control of Kunduz city from the Taliban militants in northeastern Kunduz province, on October 1, 2015. Afghan forces retook control of the strategic northern city of Kunduz on October 1 after a three-day Taliban occupation that dealt a stinging blow to the country's NATO-trained military. AFP PHOTO (Photo credit should read STR/AFP/Getty Images) Caption:Pakistani education activist Malala Yousafzai gives a press conference on July 14, 2014 after meeting with the Nigerian president in Abuja. Malala on July 14 urged Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan to meet with parents of the schoolgirls kidnapped three months ago by Boko Haram. Malala, who survived a Taliban assassination attempt in 2012 and has become a champion for access to schooling, was in Abuja on her 17th birthday to mark the somber anniversary of Boko Haram's April 14 abduction of 276 girls from a secondary school in the northeast Nigerian city of Chibok. AFP PHOTO / WOLE EMMANUEL (Photo credit should read WOLE EMMANUEL/AFP/Getty Images) Smokes rises from the Intercontinental Hotel after an attack in Kabul, Afghanistan, Sunday, Jan. 21, 2018. Gunmen stormed the hotel in the Afghan capital on Saturday evening, triggering a shootout with security forces, officials said. (AP Photo/Rahmat Gul) A wounded man is assisted at the site of an explosion in downtown Kabul, Afghanistan, Saturday, Jan. 27, 2018. The Interior Ministry says a suicide car bomb attack in Kabul has left dozens wounded. (AP Photo/Massoud Hossaini) What is going on in Afghanistan? An Afghan security force member stands at the site of a car bomb attack in Kabul on May 31, 2017. At least 40 people were killed or wounded on May 31 as a massive blast ripped through Kabul's diplomatic quarter, shattering the morning rush hour and bringing carnage to the streets of the Afghan capital. / AFP PHOTO / SHAH MARAI (Photo credit should read SHAH MARAI/AFP/Getty Images) Screengrab from video published on Youtube by Taliban media on Dec 19, 2016, showing American hostage Caitlan Coleman and her husband Canadian Joshua Boyle with their two children. The Taliban: How it began, and what it wants Alleged Taliban fighters and other militants stand handcuffed while being presented to the media at a police headquarters in Jalalabad on March 6, 2018. Afghan police said over 17 alleged Taliban militants including two Pakistani nationals were arrested during a five-week operation in Nangarhar province. / AFP PHOTO / NOORULLAH SHIRZADA (Photo credit should read NOORULLAH SHIRZADA/AFP/Getty Images) Correction: This story has been updated to correct the nationality of the official who confirmed Mullah Fazlullah's death. Mohammad Radmanish is from Afghanistan's defense ministry. (CNN) — A US drone strike in Afghanistan’s northeastern Kunar province has killed a leading militant, who was the man in charge of the Pakistan Taliban’s (TTP) operations in the Swat Valley when activist Malala Yousafzai was shot in 2012, according to a Afghan government official. Ministry of Defense spokesman Mohammad Radmanish confirmed to CNN that Mullah Fazlullah, who led the TTP from 2013, was killed in the strike Wednesday. US forces had conducted the strike close to the border of Pakistan, targeting the “Emir” of the group, according US Forces-Afghanistan spokesman Lt. Col. Martin O’Donnell. Fazlullah had been a major figure in the TTP even before he became emir in late 2013, and led a Pakistan Taliban militia in the country’s Swat Valley prior to his elevation to leadership of the group. STR/AFP/AFP/Getty Images Fazlullah pictured in a frame grab from a 2008 video. The administrative district, in northwestern Pakistan, was where militants shot and wounded teen activist Yousafzai in October 2012 as she was riding home from school in a van; the Pakistan Taliban claimed responsibility. A statement from US Forces-Afghanistan claimed that the strike did not put an ongoing, unilateral ceasefire initiated by the Afghan government at risk. “US Forces-Afghanistan and NATO-led Resolute Support forces continue to adhere to the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan’s unilateral ceasefire with the Afghan Taliban, announced by … Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, which began on the 27th day of Ramadan. “As previously stated, the ceasefire does not include US counterterrorism efforts against IS-K, al Qaeda, and other regional and international terrorist groups, or the inherent right of US and international forces to defend ourselves if attacked,” read the statement. IS-K refers to ISIS’ presence in Afghanistan. “We hope this pause leads to dialogue and progress on reconciliation and a lasting end to hostilities,” the statement added. Powerful figure Fazlullah, one of the Pakistan Taliban’s longtime militia commanders, was elected leader in 2013. The previous head, Hakimullah Mehsud, was killed in a US drone strike in northwestern Pakistan just before Fazlullah took control. Fazlullah was known as a hardliner who broadcast fiery sermons and hard-line ideology via an extremist radio station. The station was shut down when he was pushed out of Pakistan into Afghanistan. He was in charge of the Swat region when the attack on Yousafzai took place. From a young age, she has been an advocate for girls education, writing online about the intimidation efforts of the terror group, which particularly targeting schools, in her home province. She was shot in the head by Taliban militants in an assassination attempt, but survived and was sent to the UK for treatment. In 2014, she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize jointly with Kailash Satyarthi for activism on behalf of children’s rights. She is the Prize’s youngest recipient. She began studying at Oxford University in the UK last year, but in her most recent public interview, she told talk show host David Letterman about how she missed “the rivers and mountains” of her home in Swat Vallley and all she wanted was for her “feet to touch the ground of home.” She returned to her hometown in Swat for the first time since the attack earlier this year. Along with masterminding the attack on Yousafzai, Fazlullah was the leader of the TTP when they claimed responsibility for the bloodiest terrorist attack in Pakistan’s history, a December 2014 attack on a military school in Peshawar, which left 141 schoolchildren under the age of 11 dead. The attack is seen by many as a turning point in Pakistan’s war against militancy. Pakistan has long accused DC and Afghanistan for harboring Fazulllah in Afghanistan, using his presence there as a rebuttal to criticism for not aggressively the Haqqani Network within Pakistan.<doc-sep>The Pakistani army has waged a successful campaign against the militants, pushing remnants of the group across the border into Afghanistan, he says, though they still continue to carry out sporadic attacks.<doc-sep>
Pakistani Taliban leader Mullah Fazlullah has been killed in a U.S.-Afghan airstrike in Afghanistan, a senior Afghan Defence Ministry official said on Friday. An official at the NATO-led Resolute Support mission confirmed Fazlullah was killed on Thursday. The U.S. military said in Washington on Thursday it had carried out a strike aimed at a senior militant figure in the eastern Afghan province of Kunar, which is on the Pakistani border, and one U.S. official said the target was believed to be Fazlullah. Fazlullah was Pakistan's most-wanted militant, notorious for attacks including a 2014 school massacre that killed 132 children and the 2012 shooting of schoolgirl Malala Yousafzai, who was later awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. "I confirm that Mullah Fazlullah, leader of the Pakistani Taliban, has been killed in an joint air operation in the border area of Marawera district of Kunar province," Mohammad Radmanish of the Afghan Defence Ministry told Reuters. He said the airstrike was carried out at about 9 a.m. on Thursday. Nobel Peace Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai speaks during an interview with Reuters at a local hotel in Islamabad on March 30. Yousafzai was gravely wounded in a 2012 shooting after her advocacy as a youth for girls' education. (Saiyna Bashir/Reuters) U.S. Forces-Afghanistan spokesperson Lt.-Col. Martin O'Donnell said U.S. forces conducted a "counterterrorism strike" that targeted "a senior leader of a designated terrorist organization." "U.S. Forces-Afghanistan and NATO-led Resolute Support forces continue to adhere to ... Afghanistan's unilateral ceasefire with the Afghan Taliban," O'Donnell said. "We hope this pause leads to dialogue and progress on reconciliation and a lasting end to hostilities," O'Donnell added. Afghan President Ashraf Ghani announced a ceasefire lasting until June 20, but on Friday suggested it could be extended. Fazlullah's death could ease strained ties between Islamabad and Washington even as Afghanistan observes an unprecedented three-day ceasefire with the larger Afghan Taliban. Pakistan is considered key to persuading Afghan Taliban leaders, who Washington believes shelter on Pakistani soil, to open negotiations to end the 17-year-old war in Afghanistan. In March, the United States offered a $5-million US reward for information on Fazlullah. A member of the Pakistani Taliban told Reuters by telephone on Friday the group was trying to get word from Afghanistan, where most of the Pakistani Taliban fighters are now based. "We have been hearing since early Friday that our Emir was martyred along with four other militant commanders in Marawar area of Kunar. They were staying at a house when a drone fired missiles and martyred them," said Taliban member Maulvi Abdur Rasheed. Fazlullah emerged as an Islamist leader in the Swat Valley, northwest of the Pakistani capital of Islamabad, more than a decade ago. He was known as Mullah Radio for his fiery broadcasts. He was reviled in Pakistan for the 2014 assault on an army-run school in the city of Peshawar in which Pakistani Taliban gunmen killed at least 132 children. He is also believed to have ordered the 2012 shooting of then 15-year-old Yousafzai over her advocacy of girls' education. The Pakistani Taliban have waged a decade-long insurgency seeking to establish a harsh interpretation of Islamic rule, but most of their fighters have now fled to Afghanistan. They are separate from the Afghan Taliban who ruled Afghanistan for five years before being ousted in a 2001 U.S.-led military action. Washington and Kabul accuse Pakistan of harbouring Afghan Taliban and the allied Haqqani network, something Islamabad denies. Islamabad says the Pakistani Taliban maintain sanctuaries in Afghanistan.