Afghan Taliban chief Mansour bought life insurance in Pak before US drone strike killed him: Report

Islamabad, December 13

Slain Afghan Taliban chief Mullah Akhtar Mansour bought a life insurance coverage coverage utilizing a faux id in Pakistan and paid Rs three lakh in premium earlier than being killed in a US drone assault, in keeping with a media report on Sunday.

Mansour, who was killed in a US drone strike alongside the Pakistan-Iran border on May 21, 2016, assumed the management of the Taliban in July 2015, changing its founder and the one-eyed reclusive long-time non secular head Mullah Mohammad Omar who died in 2013.

The particulars in regards to the insurance coverage coverage have been revealed through the listening to of a terror funding case in opposition to him and his absconding accomplices on Saturday.

The insurance coverage firm offered this info to an Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC) in Karachi through the listening to of the case registered in opposition to Mansour and his accomplices by the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) final yr, Dawn information reported.

It emerged through the investigation that the Taliban chief and his accomplices have been concerned in producing funds for terrorist actions by way of the acquisition of properties on the idea of “forged identities”.

He had bought 5 properties together with plots and homes, estimated to be valued at Rs 32 million (USD 1,99,812) in Karachi.

The report mentioned that it surfaced through the investigation that Mullah Akhtar Mansour had bought the “life insurance” coverage through the use of a faux id and had paid as much as Rs 300,000 to the corporate earlier than his loss of life within the drone assault on May 21, 2016.

While exhibiting willingness to return the principal quantity that he had paid, the insurance coverage firm had offered a cheque value Rs 300,000 to the investigators for depositing it to the court docket in order that the quantity could possibly be deposited within the authorities treasury, the report quoted sources as saying.

“However, the FIA investigators returned the cheque asking the company to pay the principal amount along with the premium so that the whole amount could be deposited to the government treasury,” they mentioned.

On Saturday, the insurance coverage firm deposited a cheque value Rs 350,000 with the court docket, which had on September 24 ordered the corporate to deposit the quantity paid by the slain Taliban chief for his life insurance coverage coverage.

Also, on a court docket directive, a property owned by Mullah Mansour in Karachi was auctioned for Rs 92,00,000 and the quantity deposited with the court docket for depositing it within the authorities treasury, they mentioned.

The sources mentioned that non-bailable warrants have been once more issued for the arrest of Quetta and Peshawar Mukhtiarkars (land income officers) for not showing earlier than the court docket to submit their respective experiences as as to whether the Taliban chief and his accomplices additionally owned properties in Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Previously, the court docket had ordered the authorities in Peshawar and Quetta to cease salaries of the 2 officers for not submitting their experiences regardless of the court docket directives.

The choose additionally sought experiences from two non-public banks on the accounts purportedly obtained and operated by the Afghan Taliban chief and/or his accomplices together with particulars of the cash deposited/transacted by way of them, the report added.

In 2016, then US president Barack Obama confirmed that Mansour was killed within the US drone strike in Pakistan’s southwestern province of Balochistan, hailing his loss of life as an “important milestone” in efforts to carry peace to war-torn Afghanistan.

He was issued a Pakistani nationwide id card in 2005, in keeping with experiences in 2016. PTI