RUTHFULLY YOURS

“War is deceit,” Muhammad said. “Taliban Claim Assassination Of Karzai Brother,” from Agence France-Presse, July 12 (thanks to all who sent this in):

KABUL (AFP)–The Taliban claimed responsibility for the assassination of President Hamid Karzai’s younger brother Tuesday, calling it “one of our biggest achievements” in nearly a decade of war.

Taliban spokesman Usuf Ahmadi said by telephone the group had recently assigned a gunman to kill Ahmed Wali Karzai, a hugely powerful and controversial figure in the Afghan south.

More: “Influential brother of Afghan president killed at home,” by Ismail Sameem and Ahmad Nadeem for Reuters, July 12:

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (Reuters) – The younger half-brother of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, one of the most powerful and controversial men in southern Afghanistan, was shot dead at his home on Tuesday by a senior and highly trusted family security guard.

Ahmad Wali Karzai’s assassination will leave a dangerous power vacuum in volatile Kandahar province, the Taliban’s birthplace and a focus of recent efforts by a surge of U.S. troops to turn the tide against the insurgency.

He was accused of corruption and ties to the opium trade, but always denied wrongdoing and was strongly supported by his brother whose influence he shored up in the south. […]

He was shot dead by Sardar Mohammad, a senior member of the Karzai family’s security team in Kandahar who had known his victim for at least a decade and was based at a compound in the village of Karz, where both brothers were born.

Mohammad traveled into Kandahar on Tuesday morning saying he had an application he needed to give his boss, Kandahar police chief Abdul Razeq told a news conference.

“The man carried his pistol through the security checks to Wali Karzai’s room. As soon as Wali Karzai came out of bathroom, he opened fire and shot him in the head and chest,” Razeq said.

Mohammad was shot dead by Karzai’s bodyguards moments after opening fire, witnesses and officials said….