Taleban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahed read to AFP over the telephone a statement issued by Omar that said Mullah Mansoor Dadullah was sacked ‘because he disobeyed orders of the Islamic Emirate’ of Taleban.

‘Mullah Mansoor Dadullah has been dismissed as the Taleban commander because he disobeyed the orders of the Islamic Emirate,’  the statement said, without giving details.

Mullah Mansoor Dadullah succeeded his elder brother—the Taleban’s top military commander Mullah Dadullah—who was killed in an Afghan and NATO operation in May.

Dadullah, the mastermind of Taleban military operations, was the most high-ranking Taleban commander tobe killed since the rebels launched an insurgency following the toppling of their government in a US-led invasion in 2001.