Mullah Akhtar Mansur
By RFE/RL’s Radio Free Afghanistan
December 2, 2015
Afghan Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mansur has been seriously injured in a firefight following a verbal dispute at a meeting of militant commanders in Pakistan, officials said, exposing the deep divisions within the fractious militant movement.
“Mansur was seriously injured and taken to hospital,” Sultan Faizi, the spokesman for Afghan First Vice President Abdul Rashid Dostum, told RFE/RL on December 2.
Faizi added that he was unsure whether Mullah Mansur had survived his injuries.
Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid denied that any such firefight took place.
Faizi said Mullah Mansur had attended a meeting of Taliban commanders on December 1 in the Kachlakh area of Quetta, where the Taliban’s leadership council is believed to be located.
Faizi said Mullah Mansur became embroiled in a heated exchange with Mullah Abdullah Sardari, a Taliban commander and former Guantanamo Bay detainee who is known to operate in Pakistan.
Sardari and four other Taliban commanders were reportedly killed in the firefight.
With reporting by AFP