Washington, November 2, 2016 – Not less than eight al-Qaida chiefs were killed by trans-regional airstrikes in Syria, Yemen and Afghanistan, Pentagon spokesman Navy Capt. Jeff Davis has said.
Those killed in airstrikes in October are Haydar Kirkan, Faruq al-Qatani, Bilal al-Utabi, Abu Hadi al-Bayhani and four others.
Kirkan is a long-serving and experienced facilitator and courier for al-Qaida in Syria, who died in an Oct. 17 airstrike in Idlib, Syria.
Kirkan had ties to al-Qaida senior leaders, including Osama bin Laden, and was al-Qaida’s senior external terror attack planner in Syria, Turkey and Europe, Davis said.
On Oct. 21 a U.S. airstrike in Yemen’s Marib governorate killed five members of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula.
Among them was Abu Hadi al-Bayhani, an AQAP leader in Azzan, Yemen. According to Davis, AQAP has relied on leaders like Bayhani to build and maintain safe havens where the organization plans external operations.
Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook announced in Oct. 26 that senior al-Qaida leaders Faruq al-Qatani and Bilal al-Utabi were targeted in Oct. 23 airstrikes in Afghanistan but that the Department was assessing the results of the airstrikes to confirm the terrorists’ deaths.
“Al-Qatani served as al-Qaida’s emir for northeastern Afghanistan, assigned by the group’s leadership to reestablish al-Qaida safe havens in Afghanistan. He was a senior planner for attacks against the United States and has a long history of directing deadly attacks against U.S. forces and our coalition allies,” Cook said in a press release.
Al-Utabi also was involved in efforts to reestablish a safe haven in Afghanistan to use to threaten the West, Cook added, and in efforts to recruit and train foreign fighters.
“If these strikes are determined to be successful,” he said, “eliminating these core leaders of al-Qaeda will disrupt efforts to plot against the United States and our allies and partners around the world, reduce the threat to our Afghan partners, and assist their efforts to deny al-Qaida safe haven in Afghanistan.
