Hakimullah Mehsud
Hakimullah MehsudIsrael news photo: FBI

A U.S. drone killed the leader of Taliban in Pakistani, the country’s intelligence officials said, but the terrorist group denied the report.

Officials said they intercepted radio communications between Taliban terrorists from which they learned that their leader, Hakimullah Mehsud, was killed last Thursday in a drone strike. The radio messages included one from a terrorist criticizing chatter about the death on the communications system.

The spokesman for Pakistani Taliban denied the report and claimed that Mehsud was not even in the area of the drone attack.

Nearly two years ago, the United States thought a missile had killed Mehsud, but videos later showed him to be alive and well.

If Mehsud’s death is confirmed, it will be a major victory for the Obama administration, which has said it is on the way to eliminate the Al Qaeda terrorist network following the assassination of its leader Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan last year.                    

However, the United States also had high hopes that it broke Taliban when it assassinated its former leader, Baitullah Mehsud, in a drone strike in 2009.

The latest drone strike coincided with increasing Muslim violence in Pakistan. Fourteen people were killed Sunday in a bomb attack on Shi’ite Muslims as they left observance in a mosque at the end of a 40-day mourning period in memory of one of its revered leaders from the seventh century.