Author: Farhan Bokhari in Islamabad,
Pakistan
Publication: The Financial Times
Date: August 29, 2002
Osama bin Laden was probably killed
in a US air attack in eastern Afghanistan earlier this year, Pakistan's
security officials have concluded in their latest assessment of the whereabouts
of leaders of Qaeda'.
According to senior government officials,
the presumed mastermind behind the September 11 attacks - who was said
by some analysts to be suffering from a serious kidney ailment at the time
- is unlikely to have survived the intense US bombardment of the militants'
mountainous Tora Bora camp in eastern Afghanistan.
"Our assessment remains that Osama
bin Laden, who was not too well when last year's terrorist attacks happened,
could not have survived the attacks on Tora Bora," a senior Pakistani official
told the FT on Thursday.
"Even if he didn't get hit fatally,
it was impossible for him to have survived, literally surrounded by scores
of hostile troops with no possibility of receiving regular medical care."
That assessment coincides with that
given by General Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan's military ruler, who on Thursday
told BBC radio that Mr bin Laden was "probably dead".
Pakistani officials have been anxious
this week to insist on Mr bin Laden's demise, after a US military commander
suggested the US-led anti-terror campaign might have to be extended to
countries surrounding Afghanistan.
On Sunday, General Tommy Franks,
head of the US Central Command, said the war on terror could not be limited
to Afghanistan, triggering fresh alarm bells for some Pakistani officials.
"The relationship that we have with
surrounding states around Afghanistan will permit us over time to do the
work that all of us recognise needs to be done. It won't be finished until
its all done," Gen Franks said during a visit to Kabul, the Afghan capital.
Pakistani officials are worried
that even the faintest trace of Mr bin Laden on their soil would provoke
US demands to send in US troops.
General Musharraf's government has
taken the unprecedented step of sending the military to Pakistan's semi-autonomous
tribal areas in the north, where fiercely independent tribesmen have defied
efforts by successive governments to establish their control.
Up to 60,000 Pakistani military
and paramilitary troops are on duties to guard at least 178 passes along
Pakistan's border with Afghanistan, maintaining a strict vigil against
members of militant groups trying to cross over.
Pakistani troops have also carried
out house-to-house searches in some areas. But Pakistani officials warn
that if US troops were sent in to the area, the tribesmen - who are well
armed - are certain to rise in revolt.
