March 3 (UPI) -- Taliban officials said Qari Abdullah Mairaj, a key commander for the militant Islamist group, was killed in what it says was a U.S. drone strike in Afghanistan's southeastern Khost province, which borders Pakistan.
The senior Taliban officials said two other people were also killed in the strike on Thursday. The U.S. Department of Defense, however, denied carrying out the attack.
The U.S. military told VoA News that "neither U.S. forces Afghanistan nor Resolute Support conducted any strikes in Pakistan or in border areas of Afghanistan on Thursday."
Intelligence officials in Pakistan previously said an airstrike on Thursday killed at least two suspected militants. The Taliban did not confirm it was the same airstrike that killed Abdullah.
The Taliban commander was identified as the man who told captured U.S. Army Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl "don't come back to Afghanistan" in a video showing Bergdahl's release to U.S. authorities in a 2014 prisoner swap.
"You won't make it out alive next time," Abdullah told Bergdahl in the Pashto language.
ABC News released this video, below, of the prisoner exchange.