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Osama aide's wife, kids killed
08/12/2001 17:02 - (SA)
Cairo - The family of Ayman al-Zawahri, the top aide to alleged master terrorist Osama bin Laden, has published a death notice saying his wife and children were killed in Afghanistan.
The notice in Friday's obituary columns of the leading Egyptian newspaper Al-Ahram confirmed earlier reports that al-Zawahri's wife, Azza Anwar Nuwaira, and her children were killed in a US airstrike.
"The family of Ayman al-Zawahri declares to the Muslim
nation the death of Azza Anwar Nuwaira and her children," the item said. It added that they had died as martyrs.
On Wednesday, a Muslim activist in London, Hani el-Saba'ei, told The Associated Press that al-Zawahri's wife and three daughters had been killed by US bombs in the southern city of Kandahar on December 2. He said several other relatives of Arab members of bin Laden's al-Qaeda terror group were also killed.
In Washington, a US official, speaking on condition of
anonymity, said the United States had credible reports that members of al-Zawahri's immediate family were killed in a US airstrike.
A doctor, al-Zawahri got involved in the Muslim militant group
Islamic Jihad in Egypt. He rose to become head of the group and
then merged it with al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. He was considered to
be bin Laden's chief strategist and number two person in the al-Qaeda network. - AP
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