KABUL: A senior Taliban military commander has been killed in a US airstrike in Afghanistan, officials said on Sunday.<br /><br />Abdul Manan, who was the Taliban’s ‘shadow governor’ in the southern Helmand province, died of wounds sustained during an airstrike late on Saturday said Omar Zwak, a spokesman for the official governor of the province.<br /><br />Manan’s death was also confirmed by the Taliban who in a statement described it as a “big loss” for the group but vowed that it will not affect their military operations.<br /><br />Helmand — the region that supplies the largest share of Afghanistan’s opium crop — has been the scene of bitter fighting for years with 10 out of 14 districts of the province either controlled or contested by the Taliban.<br /><br />As a senior Taliban leader, Abdul Manan had led the insurgency group’s expansion as it expanded control over the opium-rich province in recent years.<br /><br />Afghan interior ministry spokesman Najib Danish said Manan was the militants’ top military leader in southern Afghanistan and his death is a major blow to the Taliban.<br /><br />Read More: Afghan president names team for Taliban peace talks<br />“His death will lower the moral of the enemy, and result in (the) improvement of security in Helmand and other southern provinces,” Najib Danish told AFP.<br /><br />Danish said that 32 other Taliban fighters were also killed in the airstrike.<br /><br />A US force spokesman in Afghanistan confirmed the airstrike had killed the Taliban shadow governor.
