One of al Qaeda's senior operatives, who was charged in the US with plotting to bomb the New York and British underground rail systems, has been killed by Pakistani soldiers.
The military announced that Adnan Shukrijumah died along with two other suspected militants in the South Waziristan tribal area.
The region is part of the mountainous territory bordering Afghanistan that is home to various militant groups fighting both in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
"The al Qaeda leader, who was killed by the Pakistan army in a successful operation, is the same person who had been indicted in the United States," said a senior Pakistani army officer.
As al Qaeda's head of external operations, the 39-year-old occupied a position once held by 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.
The FBI lists Shukrijumah, a Saudi national, as a "most wanted" terrorist and the US State Department had offered a $5m reward for his capture.
After the 11 September terror attacks, Shukrijumah was seen as one of al Qaeda's best chances to attack inside the US or Europe, captured terrorist Abu Zubaydah told US authorities.
Shukrijumah studied at a community college in Florida but when the FBI showed up to arrest him as a material witness to a terrorism case in 2003, he had already left the country.
Federal prosecutors in the US allege Shukrijumah recruited three men in 2008 to receive training in Pakistan for the subway system attack.
The New York indictment links him to the Manhattan plot and a similar never-executed scheme to attack the London Underground network.
Attorney General Eric Holder has called that plot one of the most dangerous since the terror attacks of 11 September, 2001.
The Pakistani military said that Shukrijumah had recently moved from the North Waziristan tribal area to South Waziristan to avoid a military operation the Pakistanis launched in June.
The military said he was hiding in a compound when he was killed but gave few other details about the raid. One Pakistani soldier was killed and another seriously wounded during the assault, the military said.
Pakistan's army spokesman, Major General Asim Saleem Bajwa, said on Twitter that five "terrorists" were also detained in the raid.
