President Barack Obama on Monday confirmed Taliban chief Mullah Akhtar Mansour was killed in a US air strike, hailing his death as an "important milestone" in efforts to bring peace to Afghanistan.
President Barack Obama on Monday confirmed Taliban chief Mullah Akhtar Mansour was killed in a US air strike, hailing his death as an "important milestone" in efforts to bring peace to Afghanistan.
Saturday's bombing raid was the first known American assault on a top Afghan Taliban leader on Pakistani soil.
"We have removed the leader of an organization that has continued to plot against and unleash attacks on American and Coalition forces, to wage war against the Afghan people, and align itself with extremist groups like Al-Qaeda," the US president said in a statement.
Senior Taliban sources have also confirmed the killing to AFP, adding that a shura (council) is under way to select a new leader.
Obama, who is on a three day visit to Vietnam, said Mansour had rejected efforts "to seriously engage in peace talks and end the violence that has taken the lives of countless innocent Afghan men, women and children."
He insisted there was no change in US tactics and that troops, who were withdrawn from combat duty in Afghanistan in 2015, would not be going back into the fray.
"On the other hand...it is my responsibility as commander in chief not to stand by, but to make sure we send a strong signal to the Taliban and others that we're going to protect our people. And that's exactly the message that has been sent."
He called on the Taliban's remaining leadership to engage in peace talks as the "only real path" to ending the attritional conflict.
Mansour was elevated to the Taliban leadership in July 2015 following the revelation that the group's founder Mullah Omar had died two years earlier.
He was reportedly killed on Saturday near the town of Ahmad Lal, in Pakistan's southwestern Balochistan province, when missiles fired from a drone struck the car he was travelling in.
It was believed to be the first time the United States had targeted a senior Taliban figure in Pakistan.
