WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump confirmed on Saturday that Hamza bin Laden , Osama bin Laden ’s son, had been killed in a counterterrorism operation in the “Afghanistan/ Pakistan” region, turning the terrorism spotlight again on Pakistan , where some of the world’s most prominent terrorists have been killed or captured over the past two decades.

“Hamza bin Laden, the high-ranking al-Qaida member and son of Osama bin Laden, was killed in a US counterterrorism operation in the Afghanistan/Pakistan region. The loss of Hamza bin Laden not only deprives al-Qaida of important leadership skills and the symbolic connection to his father, but undermines important operational activities of the group. Hamza bin Laden was responsible for planning and dealing with various terrorist groups,” the White House said in a statement from the president.

The younger bin Laden’s death, purportedly in special operation several months ago, had been reported intermittently in the last couple of weeks through intelligence leaks. It was not clear why the White House chose this moment to confirm it and why there wasn’t more precision about the location of the operation.

While the White House statement did not go into precise details of how he was eliminated, accounts that first surfaced on social media claimed Hamza was being escorted in a Pakistan army aviation flight from Islamabad airport when the plane nosedived in a residential area near the Pakistani army headquarters in Rawalpindi. Reports at that time said US personnel collaborated with Afghans and brought down the plane knowing it carried Hamza.

“Confirmation by @POTUS of Hamza bin Laden’s death but still ambiguity about where he was killed.US knows where. Why say ‘somewhere in Afghanistan-Pakistan region’ instead of specifying location unless purpose is to save someone from embarrassment?” asked Husain Haqqani, a former Pakistani ambassador to the US and a trenchant critic of the Pakistani military establishment’s policy of using terror groups.

Several prominent terrorists involved in major attacks in the world have been captured or killed in Pakistan, a fertile breeding ground for terrorism and statefunded terror groups. They include Osama bin Laden (killed in Pakistan’s military cantonment Abbottabad), Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (captured in Rawalpindi), Abu Zubaidah (captured in Faisalabad), and Ramzi bin al Shibh (captured in Karachi), among others. Ayman al-Zawahiri, who recently issued a statement on the anniversary of 9/11 , is also believed to be hiding in Pakistan.

The man who was once accused by his own peers of hiding Osama in a safehouse in Pakistan, former director general of militiary intelligence Brigadier Ijaz Shah, is currently the interior minister in the Imran Khan government.

Hamza, who was believed to be around 30, was said to be Osama’s favourite son from his third wife, the 15th child in a brood of 30. Documents recovered during the raid by US Navy Seals in Abbottabad, Pakistan, indicated that he was being groomed to succeed Osama bin Laden.

