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Targeted Taliban Leader Was in Iran Hours Before Dying in Drone Strike


Handout photo showing Mullah Mansur at Pakistan's Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) immigration office on the Pakistan-Iran-Afghan border. He passed through the usual entry/exit booth in front of a computer, five hours before his killing.
Handout photo showing Mullah Mansur at Pakistan's Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) immigration office on the Pakistan-Iran-Afghan border. He passed through the usual entry/exit booth in front of a computer, five hours before his killing.

Mullah Akhtar Mansoor, the Taliban leader killed in a U.S. drone strike Saturday, crossed into Pakistan from Iran about five hours before he died.

A VOA reporter has seen his passport, showing his entry and exit stamps. Mansoor, an Afghan citizen, carried a Pakistani passport when he entered the country about 10 a.m. local time at the Taftan transit point. The passport bears the name Wali Muhammad, but has his photo.

In addition, a passport control photo shows him entering the country. The photo has been shown to villagers in Chaman Railway Colony, to see if they know the person in the photo. Chaman Railway Colony was one of the addresses in the Pakistani identification documents Mansoor carried.

He had crossed into Iran at the same point on April 24.

The Taftan crossing is a busy cargo transit point, bringing goods to and from Iran.

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Mansoor headed to Quetta, about 680 kilometers from Taftan. He stopped for lunch near the town of Kochki. After eating, he headed back the road, and was sitting in the back seat of the car. He was killed about 15 kilometers away, near Ahmad Wal, about 170 kilometers from his destination.

The VOA reporter who saw the passport says it had multiple exit and entry stamps for travel between Karachi in Pakistan and Dubai between 2006 and 2013.

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