Airstrike makes key kill in Afghanistan

KABUL, Afghanistan — A NATO airstrike killed a senior al-Qaida commander in eastern Afghanistan, officials said Wednesday, and Pakistan is investigating reports that a separate CIA drone-launched missile killed the group’s No. 3 commander in its territory.

The attacks could be a serious blow to the terror network’s capabilities in the region and come as the U.S. has escalated strikes by unmanned drones in Pakistan’s volatile border region to disrupt a suspected terror plot in Europe, a Western counterterrorism official said in Washington.

It wasn’t known whether the drone attacks were related specifically to a terror plot against Britain, France and Germany that European authorities said they have intercepted. The Eiffel Tower was briefly evacuated Tuesday evening after officials received a telephoned bomb threat.

NATO said the airstrike in eastern Afghanistan killed several militants, including Abdallah Umar al-Qurayshi, a senior al-Qaida commander of Saudi origin who coordinated attacks by Arab fighters in Kunar and Nuristan provinces near the Pakistani border. NATO said an air weapons team went in afterthe strike and confirmed that the targeted structure was destroyed.

Pakistani security officials, meanwhile, said they are investigating reports that a missile strike from a CIA drone killed Sheikh Fateh al-Masri as he traveled in a tribal region near the border. Al-Masri is believed to have replaced Mustafa al-Yazid, who was killed in a missile strike in May, as the group’s No. 3 commander.

The United States is believed to have launched 21 drone attacks into northwestern Pakistan this month, more than double the number in any previous month.

The Western counterterrorism official said some of the strikes were aimed at disrupting the suspected terrorist plot aimed at Europe. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the details of the terror plot remain sensitive.

But Pakistani security officials said Pakistan, concerned by manned aircraft strikes, has told NATO leaders it will stop protecting U.S. and NATO supply lines to Afghanistan if foreign aircraft stage further cross-border attacks against fleeing militants.

The threat was seen as mostly aimed at tamping down criticism inside Pakistan, where anti-American sentiment runs high and conspiracy theories are rampant that the U.S. Army is poised to invade the nation from bases in Afghanistan.

But it was also a sign of Pakistani unease at the attacks on Saturday and Monday by NATO aircraft against militants in its northwest tribal areas that killed more than 70 militants, and a reminder of the leverage the country has in its complicated alliance with Washington.

Separately, NATO said two coalition servicemen were killed - one by a homemade bomb on Wednesday and another in an insurgent attack on Tuesday. NATO does not disclose the nationalities of troops killed until after next of kin have been contacted by a serviceman’s country.

Both were killed in southern Afghanistan where the coalition is currently conducting operation Dragon Strike to flush out militants in the Taliban stronghold of Kandahar province, but the coalition would not say whether their deaths were part of the ongoing operation.

“There is tough fighting, but this is to be expected in any situation where you are pushing insurgents out of their strongholds,” NATO said in a written response to an Associated Press query. “Dragon Strike is intended to drive a wedge between the insurgency and Afghans. ... We expect hard fighting as we continue these clearing operations.”

Meanwhile, Adm. Mike Mullen told reporters in Washington on Wednesday that the war in Afghanistan is showing “signs of progress” and the U.S. strategy probably won’t require significant changes in a status review in December.

Mullen, President Barack Obama’s top military adviser, cited improvements in training of Afghan soldiers and police to take on more of the fight, and military advances in former Taliban strongholds. A planned year-end examination of the strategy Obama unveiled last December will look mainly at how it has been carried out.

The U.S. military and its NATO-led allies are under pressure to show results in Afghanistan as public support wanes for keeping troops in the 9-year-old war. Obama added 30,000 troops to turn back the Taliban in the main populated areas and train Afghan security forces sufficiently that the coalition can begin withdrawing in July.

Mullen echoed Army Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan, in saying July will mark the “beginning of a process” of drawing down rather than a quick exit.

Mullen, who is chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said it is too early to predict how many of the coalition forces can be pulled out of Afghanistan at that time or where they might hand over functions to the Afghans.

“It’s important to get to July 2011 because I think then we will have very strong indicators as to whether this is working or not,” Mullen said.

This year is already the deadliest of the war, with 537 U.S. and NATO servicemen killed as of Wednesday. There are about 140,000 international forces in Afghanistan.

Southern Afghanistan remains highly volatile. Operation Dragon Strike has so far flushed militants out of Arghandab district, Afghan army Lt. Col. Nabeullah Khan said. It has also cleared the area of mines, a major concern for residents, he said.

NATO said Wednesday that it had detained several insurgents suspected of making bombs and was searching for a Taliban leader believed to have led attacks on coalition forces in the area.

In other developments, the Afghan government announced Wednesday that it is investigating whether the relatives or close associates of high-ranking officials are receiving improper payments, kickbacks or bribes.

President Hamid Karzai has instructed all domestic and international companies and institutions to provide the amounts of money they pay to anyone related to or close to top officials, a statement released by the Ministry of Finance said. The information must be disclosed within four weeks.

“If the requested information is not disclosed in due time, the government will consider the provider and recipient of payment to be engaging in bribery,” the statement said.

Meanwhile, Pakistani security officials alleged that a NATO helicopter attack killed three Pakistani troops close to the Afghan border.

A NATO official in Afghanistan said the attack occurred today in the border area around the Upper Orakzai region.

He declined to provide further details.

Officials from both nations declined to give their names because of the sensitivity of the purported attack.

Information for this article was contributed by Eric Talmadge, Adam Goldman, Deb Riechmann, Paisley Dodds and Munir Ahmed of The Associated Press; and by Viola Gienger of Bloomberg News.