Pakistan’s critics ask how bin Laden’s refuge went unnoticed

Pakistan’s critics ask how bin Laden’s refuge went unnoticed

By Karin Brulliard and Debbi Wilgoren, Updated: Monday, May 2, 5:15 PM
ISLAMABAD —Osama bin Laden’s slaying by U.S. forces in an easily accessible Pakistani city ended years of speculation that he was hiding in remote tribal areas and raised new questions about how his presence could have gone undetected by Pakistan’s powerful military.

U.S. forces for months had watched the luxury compound in Abbottabad, a city 65 miles from the capital that is home to two Pakistani army regiments. Early Monday morning (Sunday afternoon in Washington), troops stormed the compound via helicopter.

Four helicopters swooped in early Monday and killed Osama bin Laden in a fiery American raid on his fortress-like compound in a Pakistani town that is home to three army regiments. (May 2)
Video

U.S. soldiers and civilians alike are celebrating the U.S. military mission that killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan. Several soldiers from Joint Base Lewis McChord in Washington state stood on an overpass and waved flags at passing motorists. (May 2)
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Bin Laden was shot dead inside a sprawling and heavily fortified mansion within walking distance from a premiere military academy. He joins a list of high-value terror suspects captured or killed in populous mainland Pakistan, far from the wild borderlands where U.S. intelligence officials had long believed bin Laden was sequestered.

The Pakistani government’s failure to discover bin Laden’s whereabouts quickly intensified suspicions in Washington and elsewhere that Islamabad is either uncommitted to the U.S.-backed fight against Islamist militancy or is playing a dangerous game by sheltering terrorists even as it pledges to fight militant groups. Pakistan for years had insisted that bin Laden was not on Pakistani soil.

“How could [bin Laden] be in such a compound without being noticed?” Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said on Fox News Monday morning. A Senate hearing on U.S.-Pakistan relations is scheduled for this week.

In India, Home Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram noted “with grave concerns” that “terrorists belonging to different organizations find sanctuary in Pakistan.” He said India still believes the people behind the Mumbai terror attacks in his country are being sheltered in Pakistan.

“It is a bit embarrassing, that even if he was hiding there, [the Pakistani army] would not know,” said Rahimullah Yusufzai, a Pakistani journalist who is an expert on militancy in the country’s northwest. “It means your intelligence is not good.”

Hussein Haqqani, Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States, said his government “had no knowledge” that the long-hunted bin Laden was, essentially, living in their midst.

“If the Pakistani government had known that Osama bin Laden was there, we would have got him....We are very glad that our American partners did,” Haqqani said on CNN. “We did not know, we had no knowledge. And if we had knowledge, we would have acted on it long ago.”

Haqqani also noted that Pakistan is a large country that includes many people sympathetic to bin Laden and his cause.

President Asif Ali Zardari learned of bin Laden’s death in a phone call from President Obama, a foreign ministry statement said. The statement said the raid was carried out “in accordance with declared U.S. policy that Osama bin Laden will be eliminated in a direct action by the U.S. forces, wherever found in the world.”

The statement pointedly did not cite any Pakistani involvement in the operation, even though Obama, in an announcement from the White House, mentioned Pakistani assistance. The omission could reflect concern within the government here about a possible backlash from Islamist insurgents or Pakistan’s strongly anti-American public.
Depending on whether Pakistan was helpful, the success of the mission could ease growing tension between U.S. and Pakistani military and intelligence officials, who have sparred recently over America’s presence in Pakistan, CIA drone strikes, Pakistani reluctance to strike terror hubs and U.S. assertions that Pakistani intelligence operatives protect or assist insurgents.

Senior U.S. officials said no other government was informed of the raid ahead of time — including Pakistan’s.



Video

Four helicopters swooped in early Monday and killed Osama bin Laden in a fiery American raid on his fortress-like compound in a Pakistani town that is home to three army regiments. (May 2)
Video

U.S. soldiers and civilians alike are celebrating the U.S. military mission that killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan. Several soldiers from Joint Base Lewis McChord in Washington state stood on an overpass and waved flags at passing motorists. (May 2)
More On This Story

Osama bin Laden killed in U.S. raid, buried at sea
Bin Laden's secret sea burial adds to the mystery of his life
Bin Laden's hideout better known as a tourism, military hub
Full coverage: The death of Osama bin Laden
View all Items in this Story

Although one Pakistani intelligence official at first called the raid a joint mission that “primarily” involved Pakistan’s top spy agency, he later corrected himself to say the operation was “based on intelligence input from us,” but Pakistan did not participate.

The official said the discovery that Bin Laden was living very close to Pakistani military installations was embarrassing “to an extent, yes.”

“Had we known,” the official said, “we would have taken him out.”

On Monday, the Pakistani army cordoned off the neighborhood surrounding the house where bin Laden was killed. The newly developed area is within a military-residential zone where many officers live. But most houses in the immediate vicinity were occupied by civilians, residents gathered at the scene said.

Even by the standards of the relatively posh neighborhood, the three-story house where bin Laden was killed stood out, senior U.S. officials said. The structure was roughly eight times larger than those nearby, and was surrounded by 12- to 18-foot walls topped with barbed wire. Its occupants burned their trash, unlike their neighbors.

Though the six-year-old house was valued at $1 million, it had no connected phone or Internet service, the official said — apparently an attempt to avoid surveillance. But photos of the property appeared to show a satellite dish — a discrepancy that was not immediately explained.

A U.S. official said the Obama administration was “very concerned” that bin Laden was located in such a well-populated part of Pakistan. “This is something that we’re going to continue to work with the Pakistani government on,” the official said.

Abbottabad, which is also known for its high-quality schools and medical facilities, has become a melting pot of sorts following Pakistani military operations in the tribal areas and the nearby Swat Valley, said Gohar Ayub, a former Pakistani foreign minister who is from the city. Refugees from those conflicts, as well as from Afghanistan, have made it a city where few people know their neighbors, he said.

“That’s one reason why he possibly went there,” Ayub said of bin Laden.

Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, Pakistan’s military chief, visited the military academy in Abbottabad just over a week ago and, in a speech, said his troops had “broken the backs” of militants. His comment followed a White House report that criticized the Pakistani military for lacking a clear strategy to defeat insurgents.

Pakistan’s cooperation with the U.S. war on terror is extremely unpopular among the public, and its powerful army has long been sensitive about U.S. military presence inside its borders. While it has allowed U.S. Special Forces to offer training, it publicly denies that it permits U.S. ground operations or CIA drone strikes, calling both a violation of national sovereignty.

Following the arrest in January of a CIA contractor who fatally shot two Pakistanis, bilateral military and intelligence relations dropped to what some officials in both countries called an all-time low. Pakistan recently demanded that the United States scale back its military presence and the number of drone strikes, and a Pakistani intelligence official said not long ago that joint intelligence operations had been halted.

On Monday, that official said the bin Laden killing symbolized that “sanity had prevailed and we continue to work together.”

Earlier this year, Pakistani officials said they arrested Umar Patek, an Indonesian militant with ties to al-Qaeda. Last year, a joint CIA-ISI operation netted Abdul Ghani Baradar, a senior Afghan Taliban leader. In 2002, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, an architect of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, was arrested in Rawalpindi. Haqqani cited these operations as proof that Pakistan is serious about fighting terror.

Yusufzai, the journalist, said it was unlikely Pakistan had not assisted with or approved of the bin Laden operation in some way. “Americans would be hard-pressed and face difficulties operating in a place like Abbottabad without the army’s help,” he said.

Wilgoren reported from Washington. Special correspondents Shaiq Hussain in Islamabad and Haq Nawaz Khan in Abbottabad contributed to this report.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/pakistan-stresses-that-raid-was-a-us-mission/2011/05/02/AFd0eeXF_story.html?hpid=z3