In a key revelation, former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) officer John Kiriakou has said that Al Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden, who was the most wanted terrorist for the United States after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, had escaped from the Tora Bora hills in Afghanistan in the guise of a woman.
Pakistan's Defence Minister Khawaja Asif issued a strong warning to the Afghan Taliban following the collapse of peace talks, threatening military action in response to any future terror attacks originating from Afghanistan.
Pakistan's military-run Inter-Services Intelligence could have provided protection to slain al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden for a period of time, suggests the latest issue of The New Yorker magazine.
A rare look inside Osama bin Laden's Afghan hideout.
The officials said they had no information other than that Azhar was undergoing treatment at an army hospital after suffering renal failure.
In a secret deal struck a decade ago, the United States and Pakistan agreed that Washington will carry out a unilateral operation against Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden on Pakistani soil if he was found there following which Islamabad would vociferously protest the incursion, a media report said on Tuesday.
Al-Qaeda chief Osama Bin Laden had planned to hijack American planes traveling across Southeast Asia and crash them into United States military facilities in the region in coordination with 9/11 attacks, according to a secret interrogation report of one of his bodyguards.
They say there is no place to hide for a photojournalist in Afghanistan. Though seen as a chance of a lifetime, few dare venture in the war-torn country. One such journalist who saw war first hand is Reuters' Eric De Castro, who was a part of a three-member team that went to Afghanistan, following the 9/11 attacks.
Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden was cornered by US forces in the Afghan mountains of Tora Bora just months after 9/11 and could have been killed or captured, but the military top brass decided not to attack him with the massive force at their disposal, a Senate report says.
Pakistani's President Asif Ali Zardari, asked on NBC's 'Meet the Press' program where Osama bin Laden was, told the interviewer, "You'll have been there for eight years. (So) You tell me.You lost him in Tora Bora, I didn't, I was in prison."
'Having more than 30,000 international forces in Afghanistan and increasingly building the capability of Afghan intelligence forces, we are certain that he [bin Laden] is spending most of his time in Pakistan'
Al Qaeda's reclusive chief Ayman al-Zawahiri, who played a central role in the 9/11 terror attacks and later created the group's regional affiliate in the Indian subcontinent, was killed in a US drone strike in Afghanistan's Kabul, in the biggest blow to the global terror network since killing of its founder Osama bin Laden in 2011 in Pakistan.
ISI chief Faiz Hameed coerced the Taliban to announce an interim government guaranteed to preserve Pakistan's control over the levers of power in Kabul, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
'Jaish aided by LeT attacked Parliament knowing mobilisation of Indian military assets would be the consequence.' 'That mobilisation happened, necessitating a military response from Musharraf who moved troops guarding back doors out of Tora Bora, facilitating Osama's escape.'
The United States decided not to inform Pakistan about its top-secret mission to kill Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad as it knew that elements in spy agency Inter-Services Intelligence maintained close ties with the al Qaeda and the Taliban, according to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
'Large-impact aerial weapons have no use against dictator regimes or terrorist entities,' says Group Captain Murli Menon (retd).
'US counter-terrorism policy was encouraging and emboldening the Indians to deal with the problem of Pakistani-supported terrorism once and for all.' 'The US had been trying to browbeat Pakistan into doing what it wants, with very limited success.'
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