Subj:	Top Al Qaeda Leader Reported Killed in Air Attack
Date:	11/16/01 8:05:32 AM Pacific Standard Time

November 16 10:23 AM ET

Top Al Qaeda Leader Reported Killed in Air Attack

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Mohammed Atef, one of the top leaders
of Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network, has apparently been
killed in a U.S. air strike in Afghanistan, a U.S. official
said on Friday.

"We believe that it is true that he was killed in the U.S.
bombing around Kabul," said the official, who asked not to
be identified.

The official declined to say when Atef might have been
killed, although the Pentagon had said earlier in the week
that several senior officials of the Taliban and perhaps al
Qaeda had died in a targeted strike on a house in Kabul on
Tuesday.

Atef, an Egyptian former policeman has been operating with
bin Laden's group, which has been accused by the United
States of staging the Sept. 11 attacks which killed more
than 4,500 people in New York and at the Pentagon.

Initially CBS said Atef had been killed by U.S. special
forces, which are operating on the ground in Afghanistan. It
later updated the report to say he was killed in air
strikes.