Trump says IS militant behind Kabul airport attack arrested

An Islamic State operative who allegedly planned the 2021 suicide bombing outside Kabul airport during the chaotic US military
withdrawal has been arrested, President Donald Trump said Tuesday.

The bomber detonated a device among packed crowds as they tried to flee Afghanistan, killing
170 Afghans and 13 US troops securing the perimeter, days after the Taliban seized control of
the capital.

On Tuesday, in his first address to Congress since returning to the White House for a second
term, Trump announced that Pakistan had assisted in the arrest of “the top terrorist
responsible for that atrocity.”

“And he is right now on his way here to face the swift sword of American justice,” he said,
taking a swipe at his predecessor Joe Biden’s oversight of the “disastrous and incompetent
withdrawal from Afghanistan”.

He thanked Pakistan “for helping arrest this monster” but gave no details of the suspect or the
arrest operation.

The United States withdrew its last troops from Afghanistan on August 31, 2021, ending a
chaotic evacuation of tens of thousands of Afghans who had rushed to Kabul’s airport in the
hope of boarding a flight out of the country.

Images of crowds storming the airport, climbing atop aircraft — and some clinging to a
departing US military cargo plane as it rolled down the runway — aired on news bulletins around
the world.

Pakistani sources identified the suspect as Mohammad Sharifullah, also known as Jafar, a leader
of the Islamic State Khorasan branch in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

US news platform Axios, citing two unidentified US officials, said Sharifullah was in the process
of being extradited from Pakistan to the United States and was expected to arrive on
Wednesday.

In April 2023, the White House announced that an Islamic State official involved in plotting the
attack at the airport’s Abbey Gate had been killed in an operation by Afghanistan’s new Taliban
government.

– Afghanistan and Pakistan tensions –

Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif thanked Trump for “acknowledging and appreciating
Pakistan’s role and support” in counter-terrorism efforts in Afghanistan.

“We will continue to partner closely with the United States in securing regional peace and
stability,” he wrote on social media platform X.

Pakistan’s strategic importance has waned since the US and NATO withdrawal from Afghanistan,
that has seen violence rebound in the border regions.

Tensions between the neighbouring countries have soared, with Islamabad accusing Kabul of
failing to root out militants sheltering on Afghan soil who launch attacks on Pakistan.

The Taliban government denies the charges and in a statement said the arrest of the ISK
operative “is proof” that the group’s hideouts are on Pakistani soil.

ISK, which has claimed several recent attacks in Afghanistan, has staged a growing number of
bloody international assaults, including killing more than 140 at a Moscow concert hall and more
than 90 in an Iranian bombing last year.

Michael Kugelman, South Asia Institute director at The Wilson Center, said on X that Pakistan
was trying to “leverage US concerns about terror in Afghanistan and pitch a renewed security
partnership.”

“Pakistan’s help catching the Abbey Gate attack plotter should be seen in this context,” he
added. (BSS/AFP)