A young daughter of Osama bin Laden, now in custody with a Yemeni wife of the Al-Qaeda leader, saw her father shot dead, a Pakistani intelligence official said Wednesday.
The official from the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency said up to 12 women and children who survived the US raid on their villa were now in custody.
The child, reported to be 12 years old, “was the one who confirmed to us that Osama was dead and shot and taken away,” said the official.
Four bodies were retrieved from the daring covert attack, including one of bin Laden’s sons, said the official, speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity.
Up to three women and nine children, including the young Yemeni woman who was shot in the leg and a daughter of the Saudi-born mastermind, are in detention, he said.
Intelligence officials said the group were being interrogated.
“There are a lot of questions we want to ask them,” another official said.
The Pakistani government said Tuesday that family members of bin Laden were “being looked after” and would be handed over to their countries of origin.
The ISI official said Pakistan had shared intelligence with US agents as early as 2009, which ultimately led to the compound where bin Laden was killed early Monday.
Islamabad is under pressure to explain how Al-Qaeda’s top man had been able to live undetected for months right by the country’s military training centre, before he was killed by US Navy SEALS.
Pakistan’s top foreign ministry official, Salman Bashir, earlier told the BBC: “We had indicated this compound as far back as 2009 as a possible place”.
The ISI official told AFP that its agents had raided the house in 2003 in a failed operation to find Al-Qaeda number three Abu Faraj al-Libbi, before the compound “slipped from our radar”.
Clarifying Bashir’s comments on Wednesday, the ISI official said that intelligence provided in 2009 did not directly relate to the suspect compound.
“The intelligence that was provided eventually led the Americans to that compound (but) our information that was provided did not lead us directly to that,” he said.
A US official on Monday told AFP that three other men and a woman were killed in the operation.
Two of the men worked as trusted couriers for bin Laden and the third was believed to be an adult son, the official said.
pl show the interview with the girl on TV BBC, CNN or pak TV
The photograph of OBL seems dubious with small black beard and small face. The bullet fire could had blown his head but only made a hole.How come his twelve years daughter gives statement of relating his father shooting.Nonetheless,Osma appears to be of low IQ who chose such a wrong place to hide in big mysterious mansion raising doubt on his capabilities & of juniors to only resort to suicide bombings or killing innocent citizens. The whole story is confusing. Why did you kill Osama and not taken alive wanted few computer stuff.His twelve year daughters' statement is strange testimony difficult to believe. Something is very shoddy about everything.However,the pertinent point is if entire government has been 'jammed, so defense forces appratus;Kakul academy was close by hearing, seeing everything around osamas' mansion.Obama must produce concrete evidence than confuse world by slandering Pakistan.
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