A prominent Pakistani Taliban commander has died when his car exploded in eastern Afghanistan, a source in the movement said.
The Pakistani Taliban said an announcement about the “martyrdom of a prominent leader” of the movement would be released soon, but a source in the movement told AFP that the bombing was aimed at Abdul Wali, a commander who used the name Omar Khalid Khorasani.
His death could jeopardize the fragile ceasefire agreement reached between the Pakistani Taliban and the Islamabad government in June as peace talks brokered by the Afghan Taliban advance. And the Pakistani army announced yesterday that four soldiers were killed in a suicide attack on a military convoy in North Waziristan, where the Pakistani Taliban is stationed on the border with Afghanistan.
The Pakistani Taliban are a separate group from the Afghan Taliban, but are guided by the same ideology and a long common history.
For its part, a Pakistani Taliban source told AFP on condition of anonymity that Abdul Wali and two other commanders were killed in an explosion that “targeted” their car in Paktita province on the border with Waziristan in eastern Afghanistan.
