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US still clueless about Osama |
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By: Agencies |
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Date:
2008-09-12 |
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Place: Washington |
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Saat saal baad: Friends and family members drop flowers in a reflecting pool at the site of the World Trade Centre in honour of those who lost their lives in the attacks on the seven years ago . pic/ap | Seven years after he masterminded the attacks of September 11, 2001, Osama bin Laden is believed to wear disguises routinely and takes extreme care to avoid electronic communications, relying on human couriers to pass messages, officials said.
Pakistani officials said the CIA and the US military have played into bin Laden's hands by pursuing al-Qaeda with bombs and missiles.
Pashtun tribes along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, angry at the number of civilian casualties, see the United States as the enemy, the officials said. Despite a $25 million reward posted by the US government, no one has been willing to turn in Osama.
The Bush administration is attempting to reinvigorate the flagging hunt for bin Laden by redeploying Predator drones to Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Although they lack hard evidence, US officials said it is only logical that bin Laden is in Pakistan, where he has roamed the mountains along the Afghan border for two decades and enjoyed the protection of Taliban leaders.
Bin Laden is believed to depend on a small circle of fellow Saudis for his personal security. But officials said the Taliban provides him and his lieutenants with a network of safe houses.
According to an internal Taliban memo, Taliban security operatives have a code name for bin Laden, Taqwa, an Arabic term that means fear of or reverence for God.
"We've been imprisoned by this idea that he's either on the Afghan or Pakistani side of the border," retired Lt Gen Dan K McNeill, former commander of the NATO-led military coalition in Afghanistan, said. "Why aren't we looking anywhere else? I think we need to change this mind-set."
So where to start?
"How the hell do I know?" the general replied.
US won't take Pak permission in search for Osama
US President George W Bush has secretly given a go ahead to American forces to carry out ground attacks inside Pakistan without approval from the country's government.
The classified orders signal a watershed for the Bush administration after years of trying to work with Pakistan to combat al-Qaeda, New York Times reported yesterday, quoting senior officials.
"The situation in tribal areas is not tolerable," said a senior official. "We have to be assertive."
American officials said they will notify Pakistan when they conduct limited ground attacks like the one last week near the Afghanistan border, but that they will not ask for its permission.
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