Daily Times

KABUL: Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) commander Qari Saifullah Mehsud has been shot dead by gunmen in Afghanistan, the group confirmed on Sunday.

Qari Saifullah Mehsudwas killed outside the Guloon camp in Khost province, the group spokesperson said in an audio message, private News Agency reported.

The spokesman didn’t disclose his name in the message and claimed the attack was carried out by the Haqqani network offshoot of the Afghan Taliban as they, day earlier, had also killed three militants of Hakimullah Mehsud group in the area.

Founded in 2007 by Baitullah Mehsud, hailing from the powerful Mehsud tribe of the South Waziristan tribal region , the TTP already stands divided into four groups: the Swat group, Mehsud group, Bajaur Agency group, and Darra Adamkhel group.

Mehsud was notorious for preparing suicide jackets and suicide bombers for terrorist acts and was among the terrorists most wanted to Pakistan for his involvement in several terror attacks in the country, the report said.

Mehsud was the mastermind of a tragic bus attack in the port city of Karachi that had killed around 59 people in 2015 and he had also claimed the responsibility, a foreign media report said.

Saifullah Mehsud was fled from the country to Afghanistan after a security operation launched in Waziristan region, according to the report.

Analysts said that Mehsud’s death is a big jolt for TTP as he was attempting to unite all the four factions. “TTP has already split into several groups and Mehsud was trying to unite them. Secondly, he was the most active terrorist and wanted by Pakistan for several terror attacks,” Saboor Khattak, a Peshawar-based senior journalist, told Anadolu News Agency. Mehsud had claimed responsibility for the horrific 2015 bus attack in Karachi which killed 45 people, Khattak said