ISI is Inter-Services Intelligence, Pakistan's principal intelligence agency. It is also an epicenter of the Pakistani government's support for the global jihad. "Osama in northwest Pakistan under ISI protection: Report," from PTI, October 18 (thanks to all who sent this in):
WASHINGTON: World's most wanted terrorists Osama bin Laden and his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri may be hiding close to each other in houses in northwest Pakistan, protected by some members of ISI, a media report said on Monday.The two top al-Qaida commanders may not be together and are not living in caves as forseen by American experts to evade detection, the CNN reported quoting a top NATO officer based in Afghanistan.
"Nobody in al-Qaida is living in a cave," said the official, who declined to be named because of the sensitivity of the intelligence matters involved, CNN said.
Rather, al-Qaida's top leadership is believed to be living in relative comfort, protected by locals and some members of the Pakistani intelligence services ISI, the official said.
Pakistan has repeatedly denied protecting members of the al-Qaida leadership.
The official said the general region where Osama is likely to have moved around in recent years ranges from the mountainous Chitral area in the far northwest near the Chinese border, to the Kurram Valley which neighbors Afghanistan's Tora Bora, one of the Taliban strongholds during the US invasion in 2001.
Tora Bora is also the region from which Osama is believed to have escaped during a US bombing raid in late 2001. US officials have long said there have been no confirmed sightings of Osama or Zawahiri for several years.
The area that the official described covers hundreds of square miles of some of the most rugged terrain in Pakistan inhabited by fiercely independent tribes.
The official also confirmed the US assessment that Mullah Omar, the leader of the Taliban, has moved between the cities of Quetta and Karachi in Pakistan over the last several months....
Pakistan's interior minister Rehman Malik today said that similar reports of bin Laden and Mullah Omar's whereabouts have proven false in the past.
Malik denied the two men are on Pakistani soil, but said that any information to the contrary should be shared with Pakistani officials so that they can take "immediate action" to arrest the pair, CNN reported....
Oh, yes, that would be just the thing to do.
"... any information to the contrary should be shared with Pakistani officials so that they can take "immediate action" to arrest..." the people who are cooperating with Western intelligence services and so they can advise OBL on how to tighten his security against the prying eyes of the Infidels.
Pakistan's been laughing all the way to the bank since 2001, when OBL turned into an unexpected cash-cow for them. If they have their way, he could live well into the next decade and they would still be earnestly hunting for him, while proclaiming that he's not in Pakistan. Neither, for that matter, are al-Zawahiri, or Mullah Omar, the Taliban caliph or Dawood, the Bombay bomber.
Pakistan's interior minister Rehman Malik today said... "but... any information to the contrary should be shared with Pakistani officials so that they can take "immediate action" to arrest the pair,..". More likely, to shift them fast to another hideout.
Yes,Osma Bin Laden is the great hero who is widely admired and highly respected among international Muslim community.He really needs to be loved and protected !
HE IS THE MOST DEVOUT MUSLIM HERO,NOT A TERRORIST.
So, Osama is say, in the middle of Karachi, someone finds out and tells the Pakistani security services so that they can arrest him. The Pakistanis will just move him somewhere safer and deny he was ever there.
That is how they work.
"helped by locals and some members of the Pakistani intelligence services ISI" is a half lie. The locals are definitely not involved. If locals are involved then one or two may be tempted to cash in the reward from USA. You can only trust disciplined members of Pak Army, sworn to secrecy, to hide and look after Osama. Only the Pak Army and its intelligence agency are involved. The words 'some members' are used to give Pakistan a face saving formula so they can pretend to apprehend "the bad guys within". In truth, the Pak Army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Kiyani, is behind this with the full support of the Islamist Generals of the Army. I don't think Pak Army will accept this face-saving formula and give up Osama.
Worth noting that Pakistan held and released the supreme commander of the Taliban in Afghanistan, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar (Mullah Omar's deputy)
http://www.longwarjournal.org/threat-matrix/archives/2010/10/pakistan_releases_mullah_barad.php
And Pakistani government ministers are as trustworthy as Saddam's Baghdad Bob was.
Just increase the amount of foreign aid to Pakistan, then they're sure to like us more, right?
Why Americans understand everything slowly? There is going to be direct engagement of US Troops with the Pakistani Army and U.S. will declar this battle is the final onslaught against the Taliban. Pakistan Army, on its part, will fight the U.S. without betraying them by telling the world that they are at war with the Americans (Because even this war would be conducted by American funding!)
Forget it ! You either know where bin Laden is and get him yourselves (and if you don't know how to do it, ask the Israelis) or you shut up ! At this point, for crying out loud, the last thing you'd want to do is let the Pakis know you know what they know and did not tell you.