1 The Long War Journal: Suicide bomber kills Pakistani tribal leader
Written by Bill Roggio on September 28, 2009 7:42 AM to 1 The Long War Journal
Available online at: http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2009/09/suicide_bomber_kills_14.php
A Taliban suicide bomber killed a pro-government tribal leader in the northwestern district of Bannu.
The suicide bomber drove his van packed with explosives into a car transporting Maulana Abdul Hakim, a local tribal chief, and detonated the bomb. The blast killed Hakim and three of his bodyguards.
The attack took place at a police checkpoint in Baka Khel on the Miramshah-Bannu road, the main artery that connects the settled district with the Taliban-controlled tribal agency of North Waziristan.
The Taliban targeted Hakim for speaking out against the radical movement. Hakim had "issued a decree against suicide bombing and the Taliban were not happy with him," Mohammad Iqbal Marwat, the district police chief told AFP.
Hakim is the second prominent anti-Taliban tribal leader to be killed in Bannu in five days. On Sept. 24, the Taliban killed Malik Sultan and seven other tribal elders from the Jani Khel region in an ambush on Malik's convoy. Malik had been the organizer of an anti-Taliban lashkar, or tribal militia.
Some tribal leaders have accused Pakistan's military and Inter-Service Intelligence agency of aiding the Taliban in their fight against the tribes. In the northern tribal agency of Bajaur, Salarzai tribal leaders claimed the Army shelled their villages for raising a lashkar to combat the Taliban.
Today's suicide bombing in Bannu is the second in the district in three days. On Sept. 26, a suicide bomber killed 13 people. The suicide bomber rammed his explosives-laden car into a police station. A separate attack outside a bank and a military complex in Peshawar killed 14 more Pakistanis.
The Taliban took credit for the suicide attack in Bannu. Qari Hussain Mehsud, the notorious Taliban leader who is best known for operating camps that churn out child suicide bombers, said the attack was to avenge the death of Baitullah Mehsud, the former leader of the Movement of the Taliban in Pakistan who was killed in a US airstrike in early August.
The Jani Khel region in Bannu has long been a strategic meeting place and safe haven for al Qaeda and the Taliban. Jani Khel was identified as the headquarters for al Qaeda's Shura Majlis, or executive council, back in 2007, and al Qaeda is known to maintain a bank in the region. Ayman al Zawahiri, al Qaeda's second in command, has operated in the Jani Khel region. The US has struck al Qaeda safe houses in Jani Khel twice since last year. These strikes are the only two Predator attacks that have occurred outside of Pakistan's tribal areas.