Yemeni al Qaeda commander reported killed

Evan Kohlmann is reporting, via Twitter, that a Yemeni al Qaeda commander has been killed somewhere along the Afghan-Pakistani border. Here is Kohlmann’s first Tweet:

Slain Yemeni AQ commander Abu Abdelrahman al-Qahtani has been linked to Camp Chapman bomber Humam al-Balawi (aka Abu Dujanah al-Khorasani).

Kohlmann followed that up with a quick description of Qahtani:

Al-Qahtani was also closely tied to 2 Yemeni Al-Qaida bombmakers, “Ghazwan al-Yemeni” and “Abu Dujanah as-Sanaani”, killed in the past year.

The report is unconfirmed, and it isn’t clear if Qahtani was killed in Afghanistan or Pakistan. Kohlmann closely follows the jihadist media outlets, so it is possible Qahtani’s death was announced in a forum (I have an inquiry out on this).

Keep in mind that there have been a spate of false reports of the deaths of senior Taliban and al Qaeda leaders allegedly killed in Pakistan’s tribal areas. The latest was Fahd al Quso, also a Yemeni.

Bill Roggio is a Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and the Editor of FDD's Long War Journal.

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Tags: Afghanistan, Pakistan, Taliban, Yemen