The Pentagon chief James Mattis has praised the US forces fighting terrorism in Afghanistan for ‘taking out’ Mullah Fazlullah, the chief of the outlawed Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) who was responsible for some of the deadliest terrorist attacks in Pakistan.
Mullah Fazlullah, also known by his moniker of Mullah Radio, was eliminated along with his four commanders in a US drone strike in the north-eastern Afghan province of Kunar on June 13. The TTP confirmed his death has since picked his successor.
“He [Mullah Fazlullah] is well known for ordering the attack on the school that killed… over a hundred pupils…,” Secretary of Defence General James Mattis has said while speaking at a press gaggle, according to a transcript received by The Express Tribune.
He was referring to the December 2014 deadly rampage by Taliban terrorists at the Army Public School (APS) in Peshawar. Nearly 148 people – at least 132 of them schoolchildren – were massacred in what was dubbed by Pakistani media “our darkest hour”.
Mattis also said that Mullah Fazlullah had also ordered the 2012 hit on Malala Yousufzai in Swat. She was shot in the head but miraculously survived and has since become a global icon winning several laurels, including a Nobel Prize.
Mattis fondly reminisced about his stay in Swat – the hometown of Malala. “I’ve been to Swat… one of the most stunningly beautiful places you’ll ever go on earth, I’ll tell you. If you’ve – for those of you who ever get there, for a good trekking opportunity,” he said.
Mullah Fazlullah and his loyalists had unleashed a reign of terror in Swat in an attempt to impose their obscurantist ideology in the region, but they were defeated in a massive military operation by Pakistan Army in 2009.
“There [Swat], his [Mullah Fazlullah’s] reign was known until the Pakistan military threw him out, for the beheadings he was able to carry out there to impose his will, which didn’t last long but was certainly murderous while he was there,” he added. “So the bottom line is, he’s dead,” stated Mattis.
