Washington: The Taliban have killed the leader of the Islamic State terror group cell responsible for the suicide bombing at the international airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, in August 2021 that killed 13 US troops and 170 civilians, the White House said. Four US sources claimed that US intelligence analysts learned in early April that the attack's mastermind - whom they chose not to name - had perished in an Afghan Taliban operation. According to the sources, it was unclear whether the insurgent was particularly targeted by the Taliban or if he died in one of the clashes between Taliban and IS forces.
John Kirby, a spokesperson for the National Security Council, called the Taliban operation “another in a series of high-profile leadership losses” that the IS cell, known as IS Khorasan Province, or ISIS-K, had suffered this year.
The officials said based on classified intelligence reports, analysts concluded with “high confidence” that the chief plotter of the airport attack had been killed. However, the authorities provided no proof for that assertion or any other information on his alleged demise. The government started contacting the loved ones of the US service members who perished in the assault to inform them that the Taliban security forces had recently assassinated the leader of ISIS-K.
“They couldn’t give me his name; they couldn’t tell me the details of the operation,” said Darin Hoover, the father of Staff Sgt. Taylor Hoover, who was killed in the blast. The 2021 evacuation from Afghanistan and its aftermath continue to be a subject of heated debate on Capitol Hill, where Republicans have voiced similar demands of the Biden administration.