US claims to have captured top TTP leader

US had captured Latif Mehsud in a military operation and reportedly shifted him to Bagram.

WASHINGTON: American troops have reportedly captured a senior leader of the Pakistani Taliban in a military operation, a US official said Friday.

"I can confirm that US forces did capture... terrorist leader Latif Mehsud in a military operation," State Department deputy spokesperson Marie Harf said, describing the captive as a senior commander in the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP).

Harf gave no further details of the operation nor did she say where and when it took place, keeping a shroud on whether the operation was in Afghanistan or Pakistani territory.

"Mehsud is a senior commander in TTP and served as a trusted confidante of the group's leader Hakimullah Mehsud," Harf said.

The State Department spokesperson added that the TTP had claimed responsibility for the attempted bombing of Times Square, New York, in 2010.

The group "had also vowed to attack the US homeland again," Harf said, adding it had also been behind attacks on US diplomats in Pakistan as well as incidents that killed Pakistani civilians.

News of Meshud's capture came just as US Secretary of State John Kerry landed in Kabul on a surprise visit for difficult talks about leaving a residual US force behind in Afghanistan after international forces withdraw in 2014.

President Hamid Karzai, with whom Kerry met on Friday, was reportedly livid about Mehsud's capture.

"The Americans forcibly removed him and took him to Bagram," a Karzai spokesperson, Aimal Faizi, told the Washington Post.

Mehsud had only agreed to meet with operatives of Afghanistan's National Directorate of Security after months of conversations, he said.

Afghan authorities believed their contacts with Mehsud has been one of the most significant operations carried out by Afghan forces, who are gradually assuming sole control for the country's security, Faizi told the Post.

Bagram air base is a military base that includes a detention facility where the United States continues to hold more than 60 foreign fighters among about 3,000 detainees.

"Mehsud is a senior commander in TTP and served as a trusted confidante of the group's leader Hakimullah Mehsud," Harf said.

She told reporters that the TTP had claimed responsibility for the attempted bombing of Times Square, New York, in 2010.

The group "had also vowed to attack the US homeland again," Harf said, adding it had also been behind attacks on US diplomats in Pakistan as well as incidents that killed Pakistani civilians.

It was not immediately clear if Latif Meshud is related to Hakimullah Mehsud who took over as the commander of the Pakistani Taliban in 2009.

Karzai in August asked Pakistan to help arrange peace talks between his government and Taliban insurgents, during a visit to Islamabad for his first talks with newly elected Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.

Botched efforts by the United States in June to launch peace talks with the Taliban infuriated Karzai when the Taliban opened up an office in Qatar. The office has since been shut.