Bin Laden in Afghan-Pak border area

PARUN, Afghanistan, Sunday (AFP) - Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden is alive and hiding out along the rugged border between Afghanistan and Pakistan, a top Afghan official said. "I don't know exactly where he is but what is clear is that bin Laden is alive, he is in the region," said Zalmai Rasoul, national security advisor to President Hamid Karzai. "If we knew about his whereabouts, we would've caught him - but he'll be caught one day," Rasoul told AFP in Parun, the capital of the poverty-stricken northeast province of Nuristan which borders Pakistan. A US-led coalition of about 20,000 troops is in Afghanistan hunting the Al-Qaeda leader who was sheltered by the hardline Taliban regime that ruled the country until late 2001. Rasoul said however there was "no Al-Qaeda network in Afghanistan". "They're coming from outside and when there's pressure against them by Afghan or coalition forces, they cross back over the border into the other side," he said.