Police: Taliban commander who kidnapped South Koreans is killed

Sep 18, 2007, 8:22 GMT

Kabul - A Taliban commander behind the kidnapping of 23 Christian aid workers from South Korea was among a dozen militants killed in a bombing by US-led coalition forces, police in southern Afghanistan said Tuesday.

    Coalition forces bombed an area Monday night where Taliban commander Abdullah Jan Abu-Mansoor was staying overnight along with two other Taliban commanders and other insurgents, said Alishah Ahmadzai, police chief of Ghazni province.

    The US-led coalition forces, however, said they conducted an operation in Gero district, but claim it was early Tuesday and that several suspected Taliban fighters were killed and four were detained in the operation conducted jointly with the Afghan army. They deny an airstrike took place.

Abu-Mansoor identified himself as the leader of the Taliban fighters who abducted the South Koreans in July on the main road running between Kabul and Kandahar when he became the first person to announce the kidnappings to the media.

Abu-Mansoor and the two other Taliban commanders were killed in the airstrike in the Gero district, Ahmadzai said.

Local Taliban, however, denied Abu-Mansoor had been killed and said five of their comrades died in the attack. The Taliban's main spokesman, Qari Mohammad Yousif Ahmadi, said he was not aware of the airstrike's casualties.

Ghazni is a Taliban stronghold where attacks and kidnappings of foreign nationals have increased in recent months.

Two of the South Koreans abducted there were killed and the rest were released after 43 days in captivity.