Al-Qaeda chief al-Zawahiri killed in Afghanistan
President Joe Biden on Monday announced that the United States has killed the leader of Al-Qaeda, Ayman al-Zawahiri, in an airstrike in Kabul.
"Justice has been delivered and this terrorist leader is no more," Biden said in a televised address.
The United States has killed Al-Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahiri, according to US media outlets, in what the White House announced Monday was a "successful" operation against a target in Afghanistan.
Zawahiri, an Egyptian surgeon who became one of the world's most wanted terrorists, was identified as a mastermind of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States that killed nearly 3,000 people.
He had been on the run ever since, and took over Al-Qaeda after Osama bin Laden was killed in Pakistan in 2011. The United States had placed a $25 million bounty on his head.
The New York Times, Washington Post and CNN were among outlets reporting the target's identity, citing unidentified sources. President Joe Biden was due to deliver a televised address on the operation later Monday.
It would be the first known over-the-horizon strike by the United States on an Al-Qaeda target in Afghanistan since American forces withdrew from the country on August 31, 2021.
US officials did not clarify where in Afghanistan the strike took place.
