Intelligence agents believe Taliban leader Mehsud is alive

Islamabad: Pakistani intelligence officials said yesterday they believed Pakistani Taliban leader Hakimullah Mehsud was alive, contradicting earlier comments he was killed in a CIA-operated drone strike.

Mehsud was widely believed to have been killed in the Taliban bastion of South Waziristan near the Afghan border in January. A Pakistani intelligence official said it was now believed Mehsud had survived the attack.

"Yes, he is alive," a senior intelligence official said.

A second Pakistani intelligence official said he also believed Mehsud had survived the missile strike, though there was no hard evidence to confirm it.

"Initially, our intelligence in the field suggested that he was killed from the wounds he sustained in the strike but we have made checks and our intelligence has now concluded he was wounded, not dead. It's all based on intelligence."

If it is confirmed Mehsud is alive, it would be a blow for the CIA, which had intensified pilotless drone attacks after Mehsud appeared in a video with a Jordanian double agent who later killed seven CIA employees in a suicide attack in eastern Afghanistan on December 30.

Whatever Mehsud's fate, analysts don't expect any change in the policies of the Al Qaida-backed Taliban, who are waging a bloody campaign to topple Pakistan's US-backed government.

Interior Minister Rehman Malek said in February he had "credible information" that Mehsud was dead.

"This confusion goes in favour of the Taliban as it embarrasses the government," Rahimullah Yousufzai, an expert on Taliban and tribal affairs said.

"It shows there is lack of real intelligence and there are still areas which are still not under the control of the government."

Taliban officials have also said conflicting things about the fate of Mehsud on different occasions.