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Taliban officer kills self after he is tracked down

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published July 25, 2007

QUETTA, Pakistan - A Taliban veteran of Guantanamo Bay who became one of Pakistan's most-wanted rebel leaders killed himself with a hand grenade Tuesday after he was cornered by security forces, officials said.

The death of Abdullah Mehsud, a man in his early 30s who lost a leg years ago fighting for the Taliban, was a boost for Pakistani authorities under pressure from the United States to crack down on Taliban and al-Qaida militants fighting on both sides of the Afghan border.

Mehsud was wanted in "many terrorist cases," Interior Ministry spokesman Javed Iqbal Cheema said. "He was a supporter of the al-Qaida terror network and an active Taliban commander in Pakistan."

Mehsud was held in the jail for terror suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, after he was captured by U.S.-allied Afghan forces in Afghanistan in December 2001. It remains unclear why he was released in March 2004. He quickly took up arms again.

Police surrounded Mehsud and three other men before dawn in the home of an Islamist politician in Zhob, a town 160 miles from the southwestern city of Quetta, officials said. Cheema said security forces had trailed Mehsud for three days before moving in.

In violence today, assailants fired four rockets into Bannu, a troubled city in North West Frontier Province, killing 10 people and wounding 35, police said. The rockets hit two houses, a mosque and a shop.

[Last modified July 25, 2007, 01:31:54]