Al-Qaeda member confirmed dead in Pakistan

One of the key al-Qaeda members has been confirmed dead in Pakistan, the country's foreign office said on Wednesday.

Muhsin Musa Matwalli Atwah was killed in North Waziristan during an airstrike by Pakistani forces near the border with Afghanistan, according to Pakistani officials.

Atwah, an al-Qaeda operative wanted by the U.S. FBI in connection with the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings, was killed in April in Pakistan, according to the statement.

Atwah, 42, Egyptian, was indicted in connection with al-Qaeda's suicide bombings of U.S. embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

The United States has announced a reward of 5 million U.S. dollars for information leading to his capture.

Atwah, who also went by the alias Abdel Rahman al-Muhajer, had been a member of al-Qaeda since at least 1990 and provided explosives training in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Sudan, according to his indictment.

The indictment also charged that Atwah had been part of an al- Qaeda cell operating in Somalia in the early 1990s that provided training to Somali tribesmen who attacked U.S. forces in that country.

Source: Xinhua