Dost Muhammad alias Asad Afridi, a key commander of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan’s (TTP) Jamaatul Ahrar faction was killed in an airstrike in Lalpura, Afghanistan, it emerged on Thursday. Afridi was the TTP’s former shadow governor of the Dera Ismail Khan District, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in Pakistan.
The slain commander had claimed responsibility for several attacks including last month’s attack on a Pakistani military garrison in Zhob district of Balochistan, despite the TTP’s negation of the same. Afridi reportedly claimed that the Tehreek-e-Jihad Pakistan (TJP), which the TTP claimed was responsible for the garrison attack, was actually a front for the TTP itself and had no actual existence. He also criticized the TTP’s central shura for removing him as shadow governor of the DI Khan District. The TTP and its Jamaatul Ahrar faction – both proscribed militant organizations in Pakistan – had developed differences following the Zhob attack and led to Afridi’s removal as shadow governor. The TTP had warned Afridi over his statements regarding the attack.
