3 Taliban released for Italian journalist killed with top commander, Afghan

May 16, 2007 - KABUL, Afghanistan

Three Taliban who had been released from prison in exchange for a kidnapped Italian journalist were killed alongside the insurgency's top field commander over the weekend, the Afghan intelligence service said Wednesday.

Mullah Dadullah, a one-legged militant who orchestrated a rash of Taliban suicide attacks and beheadings, died of gunshot wounds in a U.S.-led operation over the weekend in the southern province of Helmand.

An official with Afghanistan's intelligence service identified the three others as Mullah Shah Mansoor - Dadullah's brother - Mullah Hamdullah and Commander Ghafar. They had been freed in March in a prisoner swap for the release of Italian journalist Daniele Mastrogiacomo.

The prisoner swap was widely criticized in Afghanistan in part because two Afghans kidnapped with Mastrogiacomo were not freed as part of that deal and were executed by the Taliban.

U.S.-led coalition forces, with assistance from NATO and Afghan forces, were able to track Dadullah to the village of Sarwan using "modern technology," said the official, reading an intelligence service statement. He spoke on condition of anonymity because of the agency's policy.

He said the intelligence service buried Dadullah's body in a secret location because the bodies of many of Dadullah's victims were never recovered.

Posted on 17 May 2007 @ 20:42