US drone strike kills top Haqqani network commander, two aides near Pakistan-Afghanistan border

Peshawar: A top commander of the Haqqani network along with two others were killed on Wednesday when a US drone struck a home near Pakistan’s restive tribal Kurram Agency bordering Afghanistan, media reports said. Two missiles were fired from the drone at the house in Speen Thall area – on the confluence of borders between Hangu district of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and Orakzai agency. [caption id=“attachment_4317625” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Representational image. Reuters[/caption] Haqqani network commander Ehsan alias Khawari and two of his companions were reportedly killed during the strike conducted in North Waziristan, Dawn reported. The drone strikes, carried out by US spy planes, targeted the house belonging to Afghan refugees, the report said. Local sources belonging to the Orakzai Agency said that the strike was carried out on the Haqqani network hideout. On 17 January, in the first drone strike of the year, one man was severely injured in Kurram agency’s Badshah Kot area near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. Drone strikes have surged in Kurram Agency in the wake of US president Donald Trump’s announcement of a new Afghan policy in August, in which Pakistan was also accused of offering “safe havens to agents of chaos”. Pakistan has repeatedly said that drone strikes on its soil are a violation of its sovereignty and denies the charge, saying it acts against militants without discrimination. Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mansour was also killed in one of such strikes in 2016.