Pakistan Taliban chief’s deputy denies Mehsud’s death
16:08' 08/08/2009 (GMT+7)
Pakistan Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud is still commanding the banned Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and his recorded message will be public in two days, said Baitullah's deputy Hakmiullah Mehsud as denying the chief's death, local TV channels reported Saturday.

Pakistan Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud is still commanding the banned Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and his recorded message will be public in two days, said Baitullah's deputy Hakmiullah Mehsud as denying the chief's death, local TV channels reported Saturday. Hakmiullah Mehsud, also the spokesman of the TTP claimed that Baitullah is alive and hiding at undisclosed location, the private TV channel ARY News reported.

According to an Arabic Television, Hakmiullah said Baitullah gone into hiding as a part of strategy and no contact with him after attack.

Hakmiullah said Baitullah will talk about the suspected United States drone attack in his message.

While commenting on media reports that Baitullah was attacked in his father-in-law's house, he said that it is a very shameful thing in tribal agency that a man can live or stay in his father-in-law's house and Baitullah did not stay at the residence of his father-in-law.

Local and foreign media have been reporting over the past two days that Baitullah was killed in the attack in northwest Pakistan's South Waziristan tribal region on Wednesday when he was staying at the house of his father-in-law.

The denial has created further confusion over Baitullah's death as Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi had stated Friday that intelligence sources have confirmed the death.

Hakimullah said the Pakistani intelligence agencies, military intelligence and the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) had planned to bring him out of his place but they have failed.

"Baitullah Mehsud has adopted war strategy like Osama bin Laden and Mulla Omar to lead his men from undisclosed location," he said.

A former parliamentarian from South Waziristan Maulana Mirajuddin also denied Baitulalh's death reports.

Mirajuddin, considered being very close to militants in Waziristan region, told reporters that according to his information Baitulalh has not been killed.

The government sources said Friday it is the part of the TTP's strategy to deny their chief's death.

Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik told media that Mehsud had likely been killed in the missile attack on Wednesday, adding that he had some information, but they didn't have material evidence to confirm it.

Meanwhile, Baitullah's personal driver Muhammad Qasim, who was killed in the U.S drone attack in South Waziristan on Wednesday, was buried Saturday in his hometown of Mardan, a main city in the northwest, locals said.

A senior security analyst Mehmood Shah said that Baitullah is dead but Taliban are hiding the news as they are facing problems to elect new chief. He said if Baitullah is alive they Taliban should have denied the reports earlier.

White House declines to confirm death of Taliban chief in Pakistan

The United States declined on Friday to confirm reports that Baitullah Mehsud, Taliban chief in Pakistan, has likely been killed along with his wife and bodyguards in a drone strike.

"The United States cannot confirm that he has been killed in a drone attack, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs told reporters.

However, the spokesman said that "There seems to be a growing consensus among credible observers that he is indeed dead."

"Baitullah Mehsud is somebody who has well earned his label as a murderous thug. ... He has killed scores of innocent men, women and children and is supposed to have plotted the assassination of Benazir Bhutto. If he is dead, without a doubt, the people of Pakistan will be safer as a result," Gibbs said.

Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik said in Islamabad on Thursday that the Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mahsud was killed in the missile attack on Wednesday. He said "We have some information, but they don't have material evidence to confirm it."

Mehsud has been the leader since 2007 of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, a coalition of Taliban factions loyal to Afghanistan's Taliban leader, Mohammad Omar. An ally of al-Qaida, Mehsud commands as many as 20,000 fighters in Pakistan's rugged northwestern frontier region and has directed or supported numerous suicide bombings in Pakistan, including a deadly attack in 2008 on the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad, according to U.S. intelligence officials.

VietNamNet/Xinhuanet