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A key Al-Qaeda figure, Hussein al-Yemeni, involved in a recent attack on the CIA in Afghanistan apparently has been killed in Pakistan, a US counterterrorism official told AFP Wednesday.
"We have indications that Hussein al-Yemeni -- an important al-Qaeda planner and facilitator based in the tribal areas of Pakistan -- was killed last week," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Yemeni's specialty was in "bombs and suicide operations" and was suspected of playing "a key role" in an attack at a US base in eastern Afghanistan that killed seven CIA officers, the official said in an email.
A Jordanian doctor said to have been a triple agent blew himself up at the US base in Khost near the Pakistani border on December 30, the deadliest attack against the CIA since 1983.
The Al-Qaeda operative was apparently killed in a drone strike in the Pakistani city of Miram Shah.
"The strike that appears to have gotten him was in Miram Shah, a clean, precise action that shows these killers cannot hide even in relatively built-up places," he said.
His death "would be the latest victory in a systematic campaign that has pounded al-Qaeda and its allies, depriving them of leaders, plotters, and fighters," the official said.
