Bin Laden killed
*Twenty more reportedly killed in shootout
*Obama says justice is done
*Pakistan intelligence confirms death
Al-Qaeda mastermind Osama bin Laden was killed Sunday in a firefight
with covert US forces deep inside Pakistan, prompting US President
Barack Obama to declare “justice has been done” a decade after the
September 11 attacks.
The death of the reviled US enemy, after a massive manhunt, sparked
jubilation across the United States, with a huge crowd gathering outside
the White House just before midnight, chanting “USA, USA” and waving
American flags as Obama made a sudden and dramatic nationwide address to
Americans.
“Tonight, I can report to the American people and to the world that
the United States has conducted an operation that killed Osama bin
Laden, the leader of Al-Qaeda, and a terrorist who’s responsible for the
murder of thousands of innocent men, women and children,” Obama said.
Obama said in the historic speech from the White House that he had
directed US armed forces to launch an attack against a compound in
Abbottabad, Pakistan on Sunday acting on a lead that first emerged last
August.
“A small team of Americans carried out the operation with
extraordinary courage and capability. No Americans were harmed. They
took care to avoid civilian casualties.
“After a firefight, they killed Osama bin Laden and took custody of
his body,” the US leader said.
“Justice has been done.”
Bin Laden’s demise marks the biggest triumph yet in the 10-year US
war against terrorism launched after the September 11 attacks, which saw
America embroiled in two wars, and changed many aspects of US life. The
operation will also likely go down as one of the most spectacular
intelligence operations in US history, and provide a huge morale boost
the oft-criticized US covert community. Former US president George W.
Bush who was in office at the time of the September 11 attacks said bin
Laden’s death was a “momentous” achievement and congratulated Obama and
US intelligence and military forces.
“This momentous achievement marks a victory for America, for people
who seek peace around the world, and for all those who lost loved ones
on September 11, 2001,” Bush said in a statement.
“The fight against terror goes on, but tonight America has sent an
unmistakable message: No matter how long it takes, justice will be
done.”
Pakistani intelligence officials also confirmed bin Laden’s death.
Obama said he had called Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari after
bin Laden’s death and said cooperation with the uneasy US anti-terror
ally had helped lead American forces to bin Laden.
US armed forces have been hunting the Saudi terror kingpin for years,
an effort that was redoubled following the attacks by hijacked airliners
on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon which killed
nearly 3,000 people in 2001.
A fourth passenger jet crashed in a remote area of Pennsylvania,
apparently brought down after passengers revolted and tried to prevent
it from reaching its target, assumed to be Washington.
Until Sunday, bin Laden had always managed to evade US armed forces
and a massive manhunt, and was most often thought to be hiding out in
Pakistan and Afghanistan border areas.
The death of bin Laden will raise huge questions about the future
shape of Al-Qaeda and also have steep implications for US security and
foreign policy 10 years into a global anti-terror campaign.
It will also provoke fears that the United States and its allies will
face retaliation from supporters of bin Laden and other Islamic
extremist groups.
Bin Laden’s demise will also cast a new complexion on the
increasingly unpopular war in Afghanistan, where 100,000 troops are
still battling the Taliban and Al-Qaeda after a decade of war.
Bush first said he wanted bin Laden “dead or alive” in the weeks
after the September 11 attacks.
Bin Laden was top of America’s most wanted list, and was blamed by
Washington for masterminding a string of other attacks, including the
attacks on US embassies in Kenya and Africa in 1998.
“Tonight they are first and foremost in our minds,” he said.
Amid fears of retaliation by Al-Qaeda or other groups, the US State
Department issued a global travel alert to all US citizens.
“The US Department of State alerts US citizens traveling and residing
abroad to the enhanced potential for anti-American violence given recent
counter-terrorism activity in Pakistan,” it said in a statement. New
York’s police chief Raymond Kelly meanwhile called the killing of Bin
Laden a “welcome milestone” for the families of the victims of the
September 11 attacks.
AFP
Bin Laden’s body buried at sea
The body of Al-Qaeda mastermind Osama bin Laden has been buried at
sea after he was killed by US covert forces in Pakistan, US media
reported yesterday.
Cable television networks, CNN, MSNBC and Fox said a senior US
official had confirmed to them that bin Laden’s body had been buried in
the sea, without giving further details. US officials did not respond
when contacted by AFP for confirmation of the reports.
But earlier an administration official said of the corpse: “We are
ensuring that it is handled in accordance with Islamic practice and
tradition.”
AFP
Laden was found at luxurious Pakistan compound
US forces finally found al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden not in the
rugged mountains of Afghanistan’s border, but in a million-dollar
compound in an upscale suburb of Pakistan’s capital, with his youngest
wife, US officials said early yesterday. They were led to the
fortress-like three-story building after more than four years tracking
one of bin Laden’s most trusted couriers, whom US officials said was
identified by men captured after the September 11, 2001 attacks. |