Showing posts with label OBL. Show all posts
Showing posts with label OBL. Show all posts

Friday, March 08, 2013



Bin Laden Son-in-law to Face Conspiracy Charges in New York Court

REUTERS.COM: A son-in-law of Osama bin Laden faces arraignment on Friday in a federal court in New York, where he is charged with conspiracy to kill Americans.

Suleiman Abu Ghaith, a militant who appeared in videos representing al Qaeda after the September 11, 2001 attacks, was arrested in Turkey and brought to New York City to stand trial, U.S. government sources said.

Abu Ghaith is one of the highest-ranking al Qaeda figures to be brought to the United States to face a civilian trial.

"Among other things, Abu Ghaith urged others to swear allegiance to bin Laden, spoke on behalf of and in support of al Qaeda's mission, and warned that attacks similar to those of September 11, 2001 would continue," according to the indictment, which was announced on Thursday. » | Reuters | New York | Friday, March 08, 2013

Thursday, May 24, 2012

US Cuts $33 Million in Aid to Pakistan over Osama bin Laden Doctor Sentence

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: The US is to cut $33 million from the aid it sends Pakistan over the jailing of the doctor who helped the CIA hunt for Osama bin Laden, in a fresh blow to the battered relations between the two states.

Congressmen on the powerful Senate appropriations committee voted to cut $1 million from the $800 million annual budget for each of the 33 years that Dr Shakeel Afridi has been told he must serve in jail for working with a foreign intelligence agency.

Dr Afridi set up a fake vaccination campaign in Abbottabad in an attempt to obtain blood samples from bin Laden's family, as the CIA tried to confirm the al-Qaeda chief's presence in a nearby villa.

Lindsey Graham, a Republican of South Carolina who helped push through the measure, said: "We don't need a Pakistan that is just double dealing." Senators including John McCain, the former Republican presidential nominee, have described Dr Afridi as "courageous, heroic, and patriotic," and demanded that he be pardoned. » | Jon Swaine, Washington and Rob Crilly in Rawalpindi | Thursday, May 24, 2012

Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Doctor Who Ran Fake CIA Vaccination Drive to Find Osama bin Laden Is Jailed

THE GUARDIAN: Shakil Afridi faces 33 years in jail in Pakistan despite calls from senior US officials to release him

The Pakistani medical official who ran a fake CIA vaccination programme to help find Osama bin Laden has been jailed for 33 years.

A spokesman for Khyber Agency, an administrative unit in Pakistan's restless frontier, said Dr Shakil Afridi would face decades in jail – despite calls from senior US officials to release the man who helped with efforts to track down the al-Qaida chief.

The tough sentence for the former surgeon general of Khyber will be taken as another sign of the terrible state of US-Pakistan relations.

And it will further alarm western critics of Pakistan who say the country has put far more effort into trying to understand how US spies and special forces were able to plan and launch the Bin Laden raid than into how the al-Qaida leader was able to remain for so long in the Pakistani army garrison town of Abbottabad.

The sentence was announced just days after Barack Obama snubbed the Pakistani president, Asif Ali Zardari, by refusing to hold a formal meeting with him at the Nato conference in Chicago. » | Jon Boone in Islamabad | Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Monday, April 30, 2012

Pakistan: Un an après la mort de Ben Laden, l'extrémisme prospère

TRIBUNE DE GENÈVE: La montée de l'extrémisme au Pakistan n'a jamais été aussi marquée, un an après la disparition de l'ex-chef d'Al-Qaïda.

Un an après, la mort d’Oussama Ben Laden n’a pas donné de coup d’arrêt à la montée de l’extrémisme au Pakistan, bien au contraire: profitant de la mansuétude des autorités, les "petits frères" locaux d’Al-Qaïda menacent de plus en plus l’équilibre précaire de la société.

Le commandement traditionnel d’Al-Qaïda dans la région, concentré notamment dans les zones tribales pakistanaises du nord-ouest, le long de la frontière afghane, a été selon nombre d’observateurs très affaibli par la campagne de tirs de drones américains, qui se sont multipliés à partir de 2008.

Mais l’idéologie du réseau, fondée sur le mythe de la résistance du peuple musulman face à l’impérialisme américain, et appelant à punir tous ceux soutiennent Washington, trouve toujours de l’écho dans un pays plombé par la crise économique et la faiblesse de son pouvoir politique. » | afp/Newsnet | lundi 30 avril 2012

Sunday, April 29, 2012

Bin Laden Widows Welcomed in Saudi Arabia as ‘Not Suspicious’

BBC: Saudi officials have said they have no suspicions about Osama Bin Laden's widows and children, who arrived in the kingdom late last week.

The three women and reportedly 11 children were deported from Pakistan last week.

A spokesman said the kingdom had acted out of "humanitarian considerations" in offering shelter to the group.

The group spent a year in Pakistani custody after Bin Laden was killed by US special forces in May last year.

"Saudi Arabia acted out of humanitarian considerations... in so far as there are no reports or evidence of any implication in criminal or illegal acts," the official Saudi Press Agency quoted a spokesman as saying, AFP news agency reports.

'Country of choice'

The spokesman said the group had been welcomed by their relatives when they arrived in Jeddah on Thursday night.

The three widows and their children left Pakistan for Saudi Arabia which was, according to a Pakistani interior ministry spokesman, "the country of their choice". » | Sunday, April 29, 2012

Saturday, April 28, 2012

Bin Laden Widows and Children Prepare for New Life in Saudi Arabia

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: The 14 members of Osama bin Laden's family who survived the US Navy Seal raid which killed him in May last year were on Friday preparing to live incognito - but probably in some luxury - in Saudi Arabia after being deported from Pakistan.

They included three of his widowed wives, ten children and one grandchild. One of his wives, Amal Ahmed al-Sadah, was deported to Saudi Arabia despite being a Yemeni, at the insistence of Yemen officials and members of her family who feared she might become a focal point for bin Laden's followers or alternatively targeted by al-Qaeda militants.

In Saudi Arabia, the family members are expected to reside with bin Laden's extended family, led by Osama's half-brother, Bakr bin Mohammed Binladin, the chairman of Saudi Binladin. The kingdom's biggest construction company, it is the foundation of the family's fortune.

They were deported on the orders of a Pakistan court after being convicted of entering the country illegally, but it is understood officials wanted them removed from the country before next week's first anniversary of the raid in which the al-Qaead leader was killed. » | Tom Hussain in Islamabad and Adam Baron in Sanaa | Friday, April 27, 2012

Thursday, April 26, 2012

Bin Laden Wives and Children ‘Set to Leave Pakistan’

BBC: The widows and children of Osama Bin Laden have left their villa in Islamabad, as they reportedly begin a journey to Saudi Arabia.

The three widows, who are believed to have 11 children, left the house in a minibus amid tight security.

A plane was reported to be waiting for them at Islamabad's international airport to take them to Saudi Arabia. » | Thursday, April 26, 2012

Friday, March 16, 2012

The bin Laden Plot to Kill President Obama

THE WASHINGTON POST: Before his death, Osama bin Laden boldly commanded his network to organize special cells in Afghanistan and Pakistan to attack the aircraft of President Barack Obama and Gen. David Petraeus.

“The reason for concentrating on them,” the al-Qaeda leader explained to his top lieutenant, “is that Obama is the head of infidelity and killing him automatically will make (Vice President Joe) Biden take over the presidency. … Biden is totally unprepared for that post, which will lead the U.S. into a crisis. As for Petraeus, he is the man of the hour … and killing him would alter the war’s path” in Afghanistan. » | David Ignatius | Opinion Writer | Friday, March 16, 2012

Thursday, March 08, 2012

Bin Laden's Three Widows Charged in Pakistan

THE GUARDIAN: The women have been charged with illegally entering and living in the country, says Pakistan interior minister

Pakistan has charged Osama bin Laden's three widows with illegally entering and living in the country, interior minister Rehman Malik has said.

The three women have been in Pakistani detention since May last year, when US commandos raided the house where they, Bin Laden and several of their children were staying. The commandos shot and killed Bin Laden, and then buried his body at sea.

Malik said the three had been charged in court, but he did not say when. It was unclear if they had a lawyer.

He said their children were free to leave Pakistan, but could stay with their mothers for the duration of the trial. » | Associated Press in Islamabad | Thursday, March 08, 2012

Monday, March 05, 2012

Thursday, September 08, 2011

9/11: How Osama bin Laden Caused Our Banking Meltdown and Financial Crisis

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: When historians look back on the financial and economic turbulence of our times, they will date it not from the start of the banking crisis in 2007, but to the bursting of the technology bubble at the turn of the century, or perhaps even earlier to the height of the Asian financial crisis in 1998.

The policies put in place to address these two events – first the dramatic accumulation of foreign exchange reserves by Asian economies to bolster themselves against future crises, and then the monetary easing applied by the Federal Reserve to deal with the aftermath of the dotcom boom – were to lead directly to today's banking meltdown and accompanying, rolling series of debt crises.

Yet these events were only the beginning. What really set the future in stone was the policy response to 9/11, the shocking series of terrorist attacks which have their 10th anniversary this weekend. Not in his wildest dreams could Osama bin Laden have imagined the long-term damage his atrocities would unleash on Western economies.

Before the horrendous events of 10 years ago, the Independent's Robert Fisk, one of the few Western journalists to have interviewed Bin Laden, had managed to elicit the following extraordinary claim from the world's most notorious terrorist – that he would turn America into "a shadow of itself" in much the same way as the insurgency he had helped ferment in Afghanistan had helped destroy the Soviet Union.

At the time, these claims seemed ludicrous – no more than the puffed-up, delusional conceit of the hunted and, frankly at that time, largely insignificant fugitive. Yet there is a sense in which Bin Laden did indeed manage to deliver on his promises.

With all major catastrophes, the long-term damage tends to be inflicted not by the event itself but by the response to it. America's reaction to 9/11 was to rush headlong into two, essentially unaffordable wars. What is more, to keep the economy going during the turbulence of these years, the US and its European counterparts unleashed what was to become perhaps the biggest credit bubble of all time. » | Jeremy Warner | Thursday, September 08, 2011

I have been saying for a very long time that Bin Laden couldn't have wished, dreamed of a better outcome for 9/11 than the one he has brought about. He wanted to bankrupt the USA, and he has done so, with just two planes flying into the Twin Towers.

The money that the USA has spent on security and fighting wars ever since has depleted their resources. Nobody will ever tell me that the 9/11 event and the financial crisis we now find ourselves in are unrelated. Anyone who thinks they are should take a closer look at the events that have unfolded since that fateful day.

Thank you, Mr. Warner, for bringing this to people's attention.
– Mark


This comment also appears here

Tuesday, June 07, 2011

Bin Laden Bounce Definitely Over for Obama

MAIL ONLINE: Those who forecast Barack Obama had sealed his second term as president with the killing of Osama Bin Laden look to be wrong.

According to a new poll, the 'Bin laden bounce' has already evaporated[.]

Obama's approval rating surged to 56 per cent in the aftermath of the terrorist's death but now just 47 per cent think he is doing a good job.

But it is domestic policies - notably Obama's handling of the economy - that is driving the frustration of the American public, according to a joint poll conducted by The Washington Post and ABC news.

Fifty-nine per cent, a new high, gave Obama negative marks for his handling of the economy, up from 55 per cent a month earlier.

Obama's approval rating on the deficit issue has also hit a new low of 33 per cent, a drop of 6 per centage [sic] points since April.

The state of the economy poses a huge challenge for the president, whose re-election in 2012 may depend on his ability to convince voters that his economic policies have been successful. Bin Laden bounce definitely OVER for Obama as new poll shows he could lose the presidency over the economy » | Daily Mail Reporter | Tuesday, June 07, 2011

Tuesday, May 03, 2011

Pakistan Defends Bin Laden Role

BBC: Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari has denied that the killing of Osama Bin Laden in his country is a sign of its failure to tackle terrorism.

In a forthright editorial in the Washington Post, Mr Zardari said his country was "perhaps the world's greatest victim of terrorism".

Bin Laden was shot dead by US forces in the Pakistani city of Abbottabad - Pakistan was not involved in the raid.

US officials have suggested Pakistan must have known he was there.

Bin Laden was the founder and leader of al-Qaeda. He is believed to have ordered the attacks on New York and Washington on 11 September 2001, as well as a number of other deadly bombings.

He was America's most wanted man but had eluded them for decades.

But US officials say they are "99.9%" sure that the man they shot and killed in a raid on a secure compound in the small city of Abbottabad and then buried at sea was Bin Laden.

The compound in Abbottabad is just a few hundred metres from the Pakistan Military Academy - the country's equivalent of West Point or Sandhurst[.]

US officials have said it is "inconceivable" that Bin Laden did not have a support system in Pakistan. (+ video) » | Tuesday, May 03, 2011

Monday, May 02, 2011

World Leaders React to Osama's Death

May 2 - World leaders from England to Afghanistan react to news that Osama bin Laden is dead. Julie Noce reports

Mideast Reaction to Bin Laden Death

May 2 - Reaction in the Middle East is mixed after news spreads of Osama bin Laden's death.Jessica Gray reports

Bin Laden Death News Spreads

May 2 - Joy and anger as Mideast reacts to death of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.Jessica Gray reports

A Witness Account of Bin Laden's Death

Osama bin Laden is dead. It's news many people, especially in the United States have been waiting for ten years to hear.

US forces tracked him down, with the help of Pakistan officials, to a mansion in a small town outside Islamabad.

Al Jazeera's Imran Khan tracks down a witness account.


Clinton Speaks About Osama Bin Laden's Death

Clinton speaks about Osama Bin Laden's death

Is This Photo of Osama bin Laden Dead for Real?

Photo: Google Images

It seems very strange to me that they should rush to bury him at sea. I know that in Islam, bodies have to be buried quickly; but here was a man who did not deserve to have Islamic customs adhered to. Forensic evidence would have been far more important than following custom. I hope that Obama and his special US forces had the good sense to hold back DNA evidence, and many photos of the mutilated body. The first thing I thought when I saw the supposed photo of him lying dead was this: His beard was far whiter in recent times than the photograph suggests. Now this proves nothing, of course, since it is quite a common practice for Muslim men to dye their whiskers. But it does lead one to ask oneself that question.

I am sure I speak for the many when I say: Show us the conclusive evidence of this man's death, Obama! We need to see it NOW. With an election coming up, and you being so behind in the polls, it is rather difficult to feel convinced by the meagre evidence, if any, that you have given us. Telling us that Osama is dead proves nothing. – © Mark


This is a compilation of two comments I wrote earlier today which also appeared here

TELEGRAPH – BLOGS – WILL HEAVEN: Why that photo of a dead Osama bin Laden is a photoshopped fake » | Will Heaven | Monday, May 02, 2011
Obituary: Osama Bin Laden

BBC: Osama Bin Laden came to the world's attention on 11 September 2001, when the attacks on the United States left more than 3,000 people dead and hundreds more injured.

In a matter of three years, the Saudi-born dissident had emerged from obscurity to become one of the most hated and feared men in the world.

Osama Bin Laden was born in 1957, apparently the 17th of 52 children of Mohamed Bin Laden, a multimillionaire builder responsible for 80% of Saudi Arabia's roads.

His father's death in a helicopter crash in 1968 brought the young man a fortune running into many millions of dollars, though considerably less than the widely published estimate of $250m.

Mujahideen

While studying civil engineering at King Abdul Aziz University in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, Bin Laden came into contact with teachers and students of the more conservative brand of Islam.

Through theological debate and study, he came to embrace fundamentalist Islam as a bulwark against what he saw as the decadence of the West.

The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December 1979 changed Bin Laden's life forever. He took up the anti-communist cause with a will, moving to Afghanistan where, for a decade, he fought an ultimately victorious campaign with the mujahideen.

Intelligence experts believe that the US Central Intelligence Agency played an active role in arming and training the mujahideen, including Bin Laden. The end of the war saw a sea change in his views. (+ video) » | Monday, May 02, 2011