Taliban leader ‘died in Pakistan in 2013’

And just two weeks ago, the Taliban released a statement attributed to Omar, saying he backed peace talks between the Taliban and the Afghan government.

It is, of course, worth noting that rumors of Omar’s death have swirled in the past and have turned out to be unreliable.

Omar, who would be in his mid-50s, has not been seen in public since fleeing when the Taliban was toppled from power by a US-led coalition in 2001, and there has been speculation for years among militant circles that he was either incapacitated or had died.

The comments came amid peace talks between Taliban representatives and Afghan government officials.

U.S. officials have never confirmed any of the reports and have consistently urged caution whenever news of Omar’s potential demise resurfaces.

“Mullah Omar is dead”, Haseeb Sediqi, the spokesman for the National Directorate of Security, told AFP.

The Taliban have reportedly seen defections to the Islamic State in recent months, with some insurgents expressing disaffection with the low-profile leader Omar.

The United States, he said, believes the Taliban has an opportunity to make genuine peace with the Afghan government and rebuild their lives in peace in Afghanistan.

The latest claims of Mullah Omar’s death are being taken more seriously than previous such reports.

Now the Afghan government is looking into the claims, because this isn’t the first time the militant’s been declared dead.

The Taliban, or at least a faction of the insurgent group, released a statement on July 15 purportedly made by Mullah Omar in support of the peace process.

Indeed, without a commander for the faithful, Taliban members who oppose the group’s participation in any peace talks and favor the use of violence against the state to reinstate the Afghan emirate may be emboldened. Indeed, the confirmation of his death may be the most he’s mattered in a while.

With revelations that Omar died two years ago, questions have been raised over who wrote his Eid speech and other messages over the past two years.

The Taliban leader, carrying a reward of Dollars 10 million on his head, had been hiding following the ouster of his government in 2001 by US-led forces.

The Taliban has denied reports of the death of the reclusive, one-eyed leader. When civil war erupted after the anti-Soviet war ended in 1989, Mullah Omar became leader of the Taliban movement that took power in 1996 and spread a severe interpretation of Islam across the country.

The group was targeted for providing a safe haven to Osama bin Laden’s al Qaeda, which plotted and carried out the September 11 attacks.

A Taliban spokesperson speaking Wednesday to Britain’s Sky News said, according to the information he had, “Mullah Omar is still alive and leading the movement”.