al-Qaida explosives and chemical weapons expert and a relative of the terror network's No. 2 leader were among four top operatives believed killed in a U.S. missile strike in Pakistan last week, Pakistani security officials said Thursday, as authorities arrested five more militant suspects.
Pakistani authorities have said four or five foreign militants were killed in the Jan. 13 attack in Damadola, a village near the Afghan border. Officials say the airstrike targeted al-Qaida No. 2 leader Ayman al-Zawahri. It also killed at least 13 residents, outraging many in the Islamic country.
Al-Qaida close up
A closer look at the terrorists possibly killed in the strike.
o Midhat Mursi al-Sayid: explosives and poisons expert; believed to have trained the U.S.S. Cole attackers
o Abu Obaidah al-Masri: responsible for attacks on U.S. forces in Afghanistan
o Abdul Rehman al-Maghribi: Al-Qaida publicist and possibly al-Zawahri's son-in-law.
Source: The Associated Press
The security officials, all speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to media, named four al-Qaida figures thought to have been in the village at the time of the attack, saying that their bodies were believed to have been taken away by sympathizers.
They included Midhat Mursi al-Sayid Umar, 52, an Egyptian, Abu Obaidah al-Masri, an al-Qaida chief and Abdul Rehman al-Maghribi, a Moroccan and relative of al-Zawahri..
Some of the officials also named a fourth man, Khalid Habib, the al-Qaida operations chief along the Afghan-Pakistan border. The officials referred to him as the most senior figure believed killed, saying he'd planned assassination attacks on Pakistan President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, and was associated with Abu Farraj al-Libbi, a top al-Qaida figure arrested in northwestern Pakistan in May.
All the officials stressed that none of the militants' bodies has been found.
"We do not have any evidence to prove that they have been killed, but we have indications that they were there and were among those bodies that were taken away," an official said, refusing to give further details.
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