WASHINGTON: One of the militants killed in a US air strike in Libya over the weekend was a high ranking Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) official, the US said on Wednesday.
The strike on Saturday, the first against Al-Qaeda militants in Libya, killed "two terrorists" as part of efforts to deny militants a safe haven in the country's vast desert.
The military had not said who the target of the strike was until now.
The US designated Abu Dawud as a terrorist two years ago.
He began engaging in terrorist activity as early as 1992. He was a senior member of the Algerian Salafist Group for Call and Combat (GSPC), now known as AQIM, a designated Foreign Terrorist Organization, and participated in multiple terrorist attacks in that capacity, according to the US.
As a senior leader for AQIM, Dawud is responsible for multiple terrorist attacks, including the Feb. 4-5, 2013 attack on the military barracks in Khenchela, Algeria, that injured multiple soldiers and a July 2013 attack on a Tunisian military patrol in the Mount Chaambi area that killed nine soldiers.
US military says senior Al-Qaeda leader Musa Abu Dawud killed in Libya raid
US military says senior Al-Qaeda leader Musa Abu Dawud killed in Libya raid
