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The leader of the Pakistani Taliban, Hakimullah Mehsud, has been killed in a drone strike, a high-ranking Taliban official has told the BBC. Mehsud became leader of the Pakistani Taliban in 2009, aged 30, after his predecessor died in a US drone strike.

The head of the Pakistani Taliban was killed by a U.S. drone strike in Pakistan on Friday, several security sources told Reuters, -excerpt- Hakimullah Mehsud, who was believed to be in his mid-30s and was one of Pakistan's most wanted men, has been reported dead several times before. But late on Friday, several intelligence, army and militant sources across Pakistan confirmed he had been killed in the drone strike in the lawless North Waziristan region.

New footage has emerged showing the Times Square bomber Faisal Shahzad meeting the leader of the Pakistani Taliban, Sky News reported Friday. It shows Shahzad and Hakimullah Mehsud shaking hands and hugging sometime before the failed attack in New York on May 1. During the video, Shahzad's voice was also heard. He said: "Today, along with the leader of Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan Hakimullah Mehsud and under the command of Amir al-Mumineen Mullah Mohammed Omar Mujahid (may Allah protect him), we are planning to wage an attack on your side, inshallah." Last month, in a statement read out in a U.S. court,...

TTP Leader Hakimullah Mehsud Declares: 'From Now On, the Main Targets of Our Fidaeen [Suicide Bombers] Are American Cities' The first, which the YouTube page titled "Hakeemullah Mehsud is Alive and Healthy and Delivering news about Attacks on USA," is 2:17 long, and shows a still satellite image of North America with a still image of Hakimullah Mehsud. Speaking in Urdu, he states that the date is April 19, 2010 and threatens bombings in U.S. "states & cities"; as he speaks, explosions are shown taking place across the map. (To view this clip on MEMRI TV, visit http://www.memritv.org/clip/en/2463.htm. NOTE: You...

Times Square Is Evacuated in Bomb Scare The scene at Times Square on Saturday night after police found a suspicious package inside a Pathfinder on West 45th Street. RAY RIVERA and KARIN HENRY May 1, 2010 A bomb in Times Square led to the evacuation of thousands of tourists and theatergoers from the area on a warm and busy Saturday evening, the police said. There was no explosion. “It appears to be a car bomb left in a Pathfinder between Seventh and Eighth,” said Deputy Commissioner Paul J. Browne, the Police Department’s chief spokesman. The device, he said, contained “explosive...

PAKISTAN, Islamabad : Pakistani Taliban leader Hakimullah Mehsud, who was believed killed in January, vowed attacks on the United States in a new video apparently made last month, the SITE monitoring group said on Monday. Mehsud threatened to retaliate against the United States within a month for the killing of Islamist militant leaders, according to a transcript of the video.

Pakistani police have arrested at least two people in Karachi, Pakistan. One of them, Tauseef Ahmed, is believed to have traveled to the U.S. two months ago to meet with Faisal Shahzad. CBS News has also learned that Shahzad may have spent at least four months training at a terrorist camp - raided in early March by Pakistani forces. The camp is affiliated with Pakistan's Taliban, the group that claimed responsibility for the botched attack in Times Square. Its leader Hakimullah Mehsud threatened, "The time is very near when our fighters ....will attack the American states." Prior to the release...

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - A new frenzy of rumours spread about the fate of Pakistan Taliban leader Hakimullah Mehsud on Tuesday, but a U.S. counter-terrorism official said he could not definitively confirm the death of the militant. Hakimullah was wounded in a U.S. drone aircraft attack in January. The strikes have escalated since Hakimullah appeared in a farewell video with the double agent suicide bomber who killed seven CIA employees in December in Afghanistan. The CIA is likely to step up efforts to hunt him -- if he is alive -- after the Taliban claimed responsibility for a bombing that killed...

Pakistani Taliban confirms Hakimullah Mehsud's death PTI, 9 February 2010, 01:11pm IST ISLAMABAD: Pakistani Taliban on Tuesday confirmed that its chief Hakimullah Mehsud had died of injuries sustained in a US drone strike, ending weeks of speculation over his fate. Taliban sources based in the Aurakzai tribal region told TV news channels that 28-year-old Mehsud was severely injured in a drone attack in Shaktoi area of North Waziristan Agency on January 14. The sources claimed Mehsud died recently near Multan city in Punjab province while being taken to Karachi for treatment. His body was taken back to the tribal belt,...

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Feb. 1 (UPI) -- If the death of Pakistani Taliban leader Hakimullah Mehsud is confirmed, his successor could be a military strategist or suicide bomb instructor, a report says. Both Wali ur-Rehman, known as the chief military strategist, and Qari Hussain, chief instructor for suicide bombers, rank high on the Taliban hierarchy, The New York Times reports. While Mehsud's death could set off a power struggle within the group, the report said it may be only a short one. A brief succession struggle came after Baitullah Mehsud, the previous leader, was killed last August in a similar drone...

The head of the Taliban in Pakistan, Hakimullah Mehsud, was killed in a U.S. drone attack, Pakistan state television reported Sunday. The report stated Mehsud had been injured in a drone attack in the Shaktoi area January 14 and died three days later. He reportedly was buried in the village of Mamuzai in the North Waziristan region. The Pakistani army said Sunday that it was investigating the reports. The militant leader's death would be an important success for both Pakistan, which has been battling the Pakistani Taliban, and the U.S., which blames Mehsud for a recent deadly bombing against the...

The head of the Taliban in Pakistan, Hakimullah Mehsud, has been killed in a US drone attack, according to Pakistan state television. The Pakistani Taliban are believed to have played a role in the suicide bombing of a CIA base in Afghanistan's eastern Khost province in December last year. More to follow...

ISLAMABAD – Soldiers captured the strategically located hometown of Pakistan's Taliban chief Saturday after fierce fighting, officials said, the army's first major prize as it pushes deeper into a militant stronghold along the Afghan border. A suspected U.S. missile killed 22 people elsewhere in the northwest, but apparently missed a top Taliban figure, authorities said. Pakistan's eight-day-old offensive in the Taliban and al-Qaida stronghold of South Waziristan is considered its most critical test yet in the campaign to stop the spread of violent Islamist extremism in this nuclear-armed, U.S.-allied country. The army operation has prompted a wave of retaliatory attacks...

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - The new chief of Pakistani Taliban militants who U.S. and Pakistani officials said might be dead has surfaced to meet journalists in his stronghold of South Waziristan. Hakimullah Mehsud, who became Pakistani Taliban chief after his predecessor, Baitullah Mehsud, was killed in a U.S. missile strike in early August, looked healthy in pictures broadcast by Pakistan's Dawn Television on Monday. Sailab Mehsud, one of the journalists who met the militant chief on Sunday, said Hakimullah had vowed revenge for Baitullah's killing. Pakistani and U.S. intelligence officials had said they believed that Hakimullah might have been killed in...