KABUL, Afghanistan, June 20 (UPI) -- The U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan congratulated Pakistan's army for killing former Taliban commander Nek Mohammad, Afghan and Pakistani media reported.
Mohammad was killed late Thursday in attacks by Pakistani troops trying to flush out al-Qaida-linked foreign fighters hiding in tribal South Waziristan on the Afghan-Pakistan frontier.
A hardline tribal leader, Mohammad led hundreds of al-Qaida-linked fighters, Taliban fugitives and tribal allies in a bloody resistance against a major Pakistani army offensive in March in which at least 46 troops were killed, reports said.
"The coalition ... congratulates Pakistan for their success," U.S. military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Tucker Mansager told a news conference in Kabul.
Hundreds of Taliban and al-Qaida militants are believed to have taken refuge in Pakistan's semi-autonomous tribal region following the fall of the Taliban in late 2001.
Security officials have said Mohammad sheltered hundreds of Chechen and Uzbek fighters around Wana in Pakistan when they fled the U.S.-led offensive in Afghanistan.
The Afghan government also welcomed the development.
