Ayman al-Zawahiri killing: No evidence found for use of Pakistani airspace

No evidence was found for the use of Pakistani airspace by the US for carrying out the drone strike that killed Al-Qaeda’s Ayman al-Zawahiri, citing sources, ARY News reported on Wednesday.

Diplomatic sources told ARY News that they could reveal the strategy of the Pakistani government, however, the concerned authority was looking into different aspects of Zawahiri’s killing.

On Monday, President Joe Biden announced that the United States had killed Al-Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahiri, one of the world’s most wanted terrorists and suspected mastermind of the September 11.

In a televised address, Biden said the strike in Kabul, Afghanistan had been carried out on Saturday. “I gave the final approval to go get him,” he said, adding that there had been no civilian casualties.

READ: PAKISTAN CONDEMNS TERRORISM IN ALL FORMS, SAYS FO ON ZAWAHIRI’S KILLING

“Justice has been delivered and this terrorist leader is no more,” Biden said.

A senior administration official said Ayman al-Zawahiri had been killed on the balcony of a house in Kabul in a drone strike, and that there had been no US boots on the ground in Afghanistan.

The official said that Zawahiri´s presence in the Afghan capital Kabul was a “clear violation” of a deal the Taliban had signed with the US in Doha in 2020 that paved the way for the US withdrawal from Afghanistan.

It was the first known over-the-horizon strike by the United States on an Al-Qaeda target in Afghanistan since American forces withdrew from the country on August 31, 2021.