The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it was carried out in retaliation for the burning of copies of the Qur'an at a Nato base in the country.

Badar Mansoor moved between the militant groups of Harkat-ul-Mujahideen, the Pakistani Taliban and Al Qaeda, and is believed to have planned the May 2010 suicide attack against Pakistan’s Ahmadi Muslim minority in Lahore in which up to 90 people died.

Officials said the ten killed in the strike - the fifth so far this year - included foreign fighters, but did not specify their nationalities.

President Obama received an unsigned letter late last year that was allegedly authored by Mullah Omar.