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U.S. Designates Pakistani Taliban Leader As 'Global Terrorist'


The U.S. State Department has designated Pakistani Taliban commander Maulana Fazlullah as a global terrorist.

The designation freezes all of Fazlullah's assets in the United States and makes it a crime for U.S. persons to engage in transactions with him.

Fazlullah claimed responsibility for the December 16 attack against a school in Peshawar that killed more than 150 people, almost all of them children.

Fazlullah in 2012 also ordered the attempted assassination of Pakistani schoolgirl and education rigths activist Malala Yousafzai.

Malala survived a gunshot to the head and, after recovering, was awarded the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize.

The terrorist designation for Fazlullah was announced on January 13, shortly after U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry met in Rawalpindi with Pakistan's army chief, General Raheel Sharif, and in Islamabad with Pakistan's Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.

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