Lanka Easter attack leader Zahran Hashim died in hotel bombing: President Sirisena
Colombo: Sri Lankan extremist Zahran Hashim, said to be the top leader of an IS linked local militant group that carried out the Easter Sunday bombings, died in the blast at the Shangri-La hotel, President Maithripala Sirisena said Friday.
Hashim, the head of extremist group National Tawheed Jamath (NTJ), led the attack on the hotel and was accompanied by a second bomber identified as Ilham Ahmed Ibrahim. Hashim was killed during the bombings, the president told reporters here.
The president said the information came from military intelligence and was based in part on CCTV footage recovered from the scene.Hashim appeared in a video released by the Islamic State group after they claimed the bombings, but his whereabouts after the blasts were not immediately clear.
In the video, the round-faced radical cleric was seen dressed in a black tunic headscarf and posing with a rifle.Hashim was believed to be 40 years old and a loner. He hailed from the east coast region of Batticaloa. He was a college drop-out and hailed from an average Muslim middle-class family.
India's National Investigation Agency during its probe into an ISIS-inspired module planning to kill prominent leaders in south India had stumbled upon videos of Hashim, which was indicative of a terror attack on the Indian High Commission in Colombo.The videos showed Hashim asking youths from Sri Lanka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala to establish an Islamic rule in the region.
After further investigation which included cyber trailing of some of the accounts associated with the ISIS, India's central security agencies had shared an input with their Lankan counterparts about the churches being the likely target of the ISIS module.
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Pakistan forces kill 67 Afghan Taliban personnel in overnight operations: Minister
Islamabad (PTI): Pakistan security forces killed another 67 Afghan Taliban personnel in overnight operations, repulsing their attacks at 16 locations along the southwestern border early Tuesday, officials said.
Information Minister Attaullah Tarar provided updates on the ongoing Operation Ghazab lil Haq, launched on Feb 26 in response to the Afghan Taliban raids.
Tarar said that 40 Afghan Taliban personnel were killed in overnight operations in the border region along the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
“Physical attack was attempted at one place, while a fire raid was conducted on 12 locations, which were all repulsed without any loss of life,” he said in an update posted on X.
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“At least 40 Afghan Taliban were killed in the overnight operations in KP,” he said, adding that “follow-up” operations continued.
Separately, the Afghan Taliban resorted to physical attack from across the border on 16 locations in Northern Balochistan in Qilla Saifullah, Noshki and Chaman districts while engaging Pakistan troops on 25 locations in a fire raid.
“The attacks at all the locations were repulsed with Afghan Taliban suffering 27 killed and scores injured,” he said.
The minister also said that one soldier of the paramilitary Frontier Corps (FC) Balochistan North was killed while five soldiers were injured.
On Monday, the minister said in a statement that Pakistani security forces killed 435 Afghan Taliban combatants and another 630 of them were injured. He said that 188 tanks and armoured vehicles were destroyed, 31 Afghan posts were captured and 51 locations across Afghanistan were successfully targeted in air strikes.
Meanwhile, state-run PTV reported that the Pakistan armed forces successfully conducted an air operation in Afghanistan’s Nangarhar province, destroying the Khogani base.
“Fitna al-Khawarij and Afghan Taliban face massive setbacks on every front after unprovoked aggression,” PTV reported, citing sources.
It further reported that security sources said Operation Ghadab-ul-Haq is still ongoing and will continue until its objectives are achieved.
