| Afghan authorities on Monday confirmed the arrest of a senior Taliban commander who was allegedly planning terror attacks in the south of the country. Mullah Janan was arrested in the southern city of Kandahar on Saturday. Janan was taken into custody with four other men accused of plotting to explode a bomb in a populated part of Kandahar near a government facility. On Sunday, Foreign Minister Abdullah described Janan as "one of the notorious links of Al Qaeda among the Taliban." Janan served as a Taliban commander in the northern provinces of Badghis and Faryab. Before that, he also was a commander loyal to Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. |