The death of Osama bin Laden

Pakistani police cordon off a street beside Osama Bin Laden's final hideout after US special forces killed the Al Qaeda leader in May 02, 2011. (AFP/ File photo)
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Updated 25 May 2020
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The death of Osama bin Laden

Long before US special forces caught the world’s most-wanted man, our Southeast Asia  bureau chief interviewed him

Summary

On May 2, 2011, a US special forces team stormed a walled compound in the northeastern Pakistani city of Abbottabad and shot dead Osama bin Laden, the leader of Al-Qaeda.

The operation, carried out in the early hours of the morning, brought an end to a 10-year hunt for the world’s most-wanted terrorist, responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks on the US in 2001 and numerous other terrorist outrages.

The following day, an Arab News editorial celebrated the “lifting of a curse” on the Muslim world. Bin Laden and his “twisted version of Islam,” declared the paper, had made the religion “feared and despised among millions upon millions of people” and had been responsible for much of “the spreading tide of international Islamophobia.”

DUBAI: The tall, thin man wore a smoke-colored, ankle-length thobe and bright white turban, and held an AK-74 assault rifle close to his chest. As I stepped into the room and he moved forward and embraced me, the gravity of the moment finally dawned: I was face to face with Osama bin Laden, the most-wanted man in the world.

I had spent a good part of my career over the decades thinking and writing about Bin Laden and the Al-Qaeda militant group that he had turned into a multinational enterprise for the export of militancy.

Key Dates

  • 1

    Osama bin Laden, son of a wealthy Saudi businessman, forms Al-Qaeda to support Afghan resistance to the Soviet invasion.

    Timeline Image 1988

  • 2

    Saudi Arabia revokes bin Laden’s citizenship for his support of Islamic extremism.

  • 3

    Bin Laden issues a declaration of jihad, pledging to drive US forces from the Arabian Peninsula and overthrow the Saudi government.

  • 4

    Twin Al-Qaeda truck-bomb attacks on US embassies in Tanzania and Kenya leave 200 dead; the FBI places bin Laden on its most-wanted list.

    Timeline Image Aug. 7, 1998

  • 5

    Coordinated attacks on the US, masterminded by bin Laden, leave almost 3,000 dead.

    Timeline Image Sept. 11, 2001

  • 6

    Bin Laden escapes US attack on Al-Qaeda caves and tunnels in the Tora Bora mountains of eastern Afghanistan.

  • 7

    US Navy SEALs storm bin Laden’s hideout in Abbottabad, Pakistan, shortly after 1 a.m. local time.

    Timeline Image May 2, 2011

Now here I was at his heavily guarded, mud-walled hideaway in southern Afghanistan on June 21, 2001 — less than three months before the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001 would spread the names Al-Qaeda and its founder to every corner of the globe.

I was Asia correspondent with the London-based Middle East Broadcasting Center at the time and had received a phone call three months before inviting me to Afghanistan to meet Bin Laden. So, as we settled down on a mattress on the floor that summer afternoon, my first question was why he had granted me the interview and what message he wanted to send to the world through me.

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Moments earlier, Bin Laden had said he would be giving only “limited comments” as he was restrained from talking to the media by his hosts in Afghanistan, the Taliban, who rose to power in the war-ravaged nation largely on the strength of Bin Laden’s aid and, in turn, provided him refuge.

Instead, his aides in the room did much of the talking during the three-hour-long meeting. Notable among them were Mohammed Atif (alias Abu Hafs), Al-Qaeda’s military leader; Ayman Al-Zawahiri, who now heads what remains of the transnational militant group; and Othman, a man assigned to handle logistics for my interview and who identified himself only with a first name.

“President Obama said the remains had been handled in accordance with Islamic custom, which requires speedy burial, and the Pentagon later said the body was placed into the waters of the northern Arabian Sea after adhering to Islamic procedures — including washing the corpse — aboard the aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson.”

From a front-page Arab News story by Azhar Masood

“In the coming weeks, there will be a big surprise; we are going to hit American and Israeli installations,” Abu Hafs said. “The coffin business will increase in the United States.”

I looked at Bin Laden and asked if this was true; he smiled and nodded.

In an interview with Pamela Constable for The Washington Post the following month, I would reiterate this: “They said there would be attacks against American and Israeli facilities within the next several weeks. I am 100 percent sure of this, and it was absolutely clear they had brought me there to hear this message.”

Two months later, the 9/11 attacks would prove that Bin Laden’s chilling message to me had, indeed, been true. 
When the interview ended, Bin Laden’s personal photographer snapped photos of us and filmed me with Al-Zawahiri and the Al-Qaeda founder, who said he would invite me to interview him again.




A page from the Arab News archive from May. 3, 2011.

“If something big happens, I will be hiding in the tribal areas of Pakistan,” Bin Laden said as he shook my hand and walked out of the room. “That’s where you can come again to interview me.”

A decade later, at 4 a.m. on May 2, 2011, I was at Islamabad airport ready to board a flight to Dubai when a journalist in Kabul texted, asking if I had heard rumors that Bin Laden had been killed in a US raid in Pakistan. A few hours earlier, a Pakistani journalist had sent me a text about a helicopter crash in the garrison city of Abbottabad.




The compound where Osama bin Laden was killed in Abbottabad, Pakistan. Photograph. (Reuters / File)

Suspecting that the two events might be connected and following my reporter’s instinct, I walked up to an airline representative and told him that I was a journalist and needed his help getting my luggage off the flight. The man got excited at the news that Bin Laden may be dead and led me by the hand back through immigration, telling other colleagues to help me because I had to cover one of the biggest stories in modern history.

From the airport, I left directly for Abbottabad, 50 km north of the Pakistani capital of Islamabad, arriving there at 9 a.m. By then, a large group of excited journalists had gathered near the compound where Bin Laden had hidden for years, kept from entering by Pakistani soldiers standing guard.

“Now here I was at his heavily guarded, mud-walled hideaway in southern Afghanistan on June 21, 2001 — less than three months before the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001.”

Baker Atyani

Meanwhile, US President Barack Obama confirmed that Bin Laden had been killed in a night raid by US forces in Abbottabad city, not far from the tribal regions where the militant leader had told me he would flee from Afghanistan. It was the end of a decade-long hunt for the man who had redefined the threat of terrorism for the 21st century.

To date, the US has disclosed few details of the raid. Only a small number of people — a handful of senior administration and military officials and the Navy SEALs who carried out the operation — were privy to the events of May 2, and the US government classified most of the documents relating to the raid. Questions also remain about the

Pakistani government’s role, if any, in allowing Bin Laden to hide in a compound within sight of an elite military academy.

As the years go by, I often think of that meeting at Bin Laden’s desert hideout and whether he could have predicted that after him, Al-Qaeda’s ranks would be hollowed out by relentless American attacks and the rise of Daesh. I also wonder what more he would have had to say if we had met again.

Indeed, in November 2001, barely two months after the 9/11 attacks, Othman, Bin Laden’s logistics aide, called to say “the person” was ready to meet me again.
“Will you come?” he asked.

I never got back to Othman and so my meeting with Bin Laden remains the last time before 9/11 that the Al-Qaeda founder is known to have met and given an interview to a journalist.

  • Baker Al-Atyani, head of Arab News’ Southeast Asia bureau, interviewed Osama bin Laden three months before the 9/11 attacks


University of Birmingham students facing disciplinary hearing over pro-Palestine activism

Updated 7 sec ago
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University of Birmingham students facing disciplinary hearing over pro-Palestine activism

  • Student Antonia Listrat: ‘Funding genocide is violent; protesting genocide is peaceful’
  • Legal rights group sounds alarm over ‘nationwide crackdown’ on solidarity with Palestinians

LONDON: Two pro-Palestine students at the UK’s University of Birmingham are facing disciplinary proceedings over their activism, with a major legal rights group sounding the alarm over a “nationwide crackdown” on solidarity with the Palestinian people.

The European Legal Support Centre submitted legal documents to the university’s misconduct panel on behalf of the two students, Mariyah Ali and Antonia Listrat.

Amid the war in Gaza and sweeping pro-Palestine solidarity at institutions across the UK, the two students had demanded that their university divest from arms companies supplying the Israeli military.

Ali and Listrat face a disciplinary hearing on April 7, with the ELSC urging the university to dismiss the proceedings.

Coventry MP Zarah Sultana labeled the university’s move “an assault on democratic rights,” while the decision was questioned by UN Special Rapporteur Gina Romero, who highlighted “harassment, intimidation and reprisals” against the students at the university.

The pair have been supported by the university’s student body, which elected Listrat as guild president and Ali as ethnic minorities officer.

Ali said: “The disciplinary process against Antonia and me is a blatant attempt to suppress dissent and silence the wider student movement.

“This authoritarian crackdown is not just an attack on our right to protest — it is a display of institutional Islamophobia and bureaucratic repression.

“The student movement for Palestine is stronger than ever. Instead of charging students, the University of Birmingham must focus on divesting from companies complicit in genocide and war crimes.”

The student union also passed a motion supporting pro-Palestine solidarity that was subsequently blocked by union trustees.

By taking punitive measures against the students, the university is “contradicting the democratic will of students,” the ELSC said.

Anna Ost, the center’s senior legal officer, added: “We are deeply concerned that the university’s intention and effect in targeting these two students is to dissuade the wider university community from speaking out for Palestine.

“The university needs to change its approach, drop the disciplinaries, and demonstrate that fundamental freedoms are still promoted on its campus.”

The targeting of the students is part a wider crackdown on pro-Palestine activism across the UK in the wake of Israel’s war in Gaza.

Since October 2023, at least 28 universities across the UK have disciplined more than 113 students for activism, a joint investigation by Sky News and Liberty Investigates found.

The ELSC warned that the campus crackdowns, which have involved police and private security, is creating a “chilling effect” that “sets a dangerous precedent for campus democracy.”

British universities are legally bound to protect freedom of expression under the education and human rights acts, it added, warning that the University of Birmingham is “violating these obligations by penalizing students for their political beliefs.”

The center called on the university to dismiss the charges against the students and uphold freedom of speech, expression and assembly on campus.

Listrat said protesting is “an integral part of campus life” that signifies a “healthy and progressive society.”

She added: “As far-right rhetoric rises throughout the world, we need to make a huge effort to protect our rights and uphold international law and morality.

“Enabling genocide and profiting from human rights violations is quite a violent stance that the University of Birmingham has taken. Funding genocide is violent; protesting genocide is peaceful.”


German military to order exploding drones for first time, sources say

Updated 43 min 16 sec ago
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German military to order exploding drones for first time, sources say

  • Russia and Ukraine have fielded such single-use drones
  • The procurement of armed drones has been controversial in Germany

BERLIN: The German military will be armed with loitering munitions, or exploding drones, for the first time, two defense ministry sources said on Thursday, as Berlin tries to catch up with a technology that has shown its destructive power in Ukraine.
Both Russia and Ukraine have fielded such single-use drones, which cruise toward their target before plummeting at velocity and detonating on impact.
But the procurement of armed drones has been controversial in Germany, with some politicians associating them with targeted extrajudicial killings by US forces in Afghanistan.
It took years of heated debate before parliament agreed in 2022 to enable a large drone such as the Heron TP, which flies at much higher altitudes, to carry arms.
However, military upgrades are more urgent now for Germany, amid the continuing war between Russia and Ukraine and doubts about the future of US military protection.
Last month, parliament approved plans for a defense spending surge worth hundreds of billions of euros.
Contracts with two companies for a first batch of exploding drones will be signed in the coming days, the sources said, declining to name the companies. The army, air force and navy will test them in the following months.
“The use of drones and the defense against drones is crucial for the survival of our troops on the modern battlefield, that’s something we learned in Ukraine,” said one of the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
“Each soldier must be capable of operating drones, just as today, everybody knows how to use binoculars.”
Germany will aim to sign longer-term contracts by the end of the year for a larger number of drones, shortening the period for introducing new weapons which usually takes years.
As drone technology evolves rapidly, the deals will specify that companies supply a limited number initially for training purposes, and that they may be asked later to supply a larger number of the latest models at short notice, if needed.
“There’s no use in purchasing thousands of drones ... only to realize they are outdated by the time we need them,” one of the sources said.


Trump moves to fire several national security officials over concerns they’re not loyal

Updated 03 April 2025
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Trump moves to fire several national security officials over concerns they’re not loyal

  • National security adviser Mike Waltz is fighting back criticism over using Signal app to discuss attacks on Yemen's Houthi militants

WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump has moved to fire several senior White House National Security Council officials soon after he was urged by far-right activist Laura Loomer to purge staffers she deemed insufficiently committed to his Make America Great Again agenda, several people familiar with the matter said Thursday.
Loomer presented her research to Trump in an Oval Office meeting on Wednesday, making her case for the firings, the people said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive personnel matters. Vice President JD Vance, chief of staff Susie Wiles, national security adviser Mike Waltz and Serio Gor, the director of the Presidential Personnel Office, took part in the meeting, the people said.
NSC spokesman Brian Hughes declined to comment on the meeting or the firings, insisting that the White House does not discuss personnel matters.
Loomer, who has promoted 9/11 conspiracy theories, was a frequent presence on the campaign trail during Trump’s 2024 successful White House run. More recently, she’s been speaking out on social media about some members of Trump’s national security team that she insists can’t be trusted.
The move by Trump to push out staff comes at a moment when his national security adviser Mike Waltz is fighting back criticism over using the publicly available encrypted Signal app to discuss planning for the sensitive March 15 military operation targeting Houthi militants in Yemen.
A journalist, The Atlantic magazine’s Jeffrey Rosenberg, was mistakenly added to the chain and revealed that Trump’s team used it to discuss precise timing of the operation, aircraft used to carry out the strikes and more.
Waltz has taken responsibility for building text chain, but has said he does not know how Rosenberg ended up being included.


Russia, African juntas blast Ukraine as they deepen ties

Updated 03 April 2025
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Russia, African juntas blast Ukraine as they deepen ties

  • Moscow has tried to build new partnerships in Africa, where it has been growing in influence in recent years, including militarily
  • Foreign ministers from Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso met Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in Moscow for the summit

MOSCOW: Russia and a group of west African countries led by military juntas hailed growing military ties at a summit in Moscow on Thursday, with some condemning Ukraine as a “terrorist” state.
Facing isolation in the West following its full-scale offensive against Ukraine, Moscow has tried to build new partnerships in Africa, where it has been growing in influence in recent years, including militarily.
Foreign ministers from Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso met Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in Moscow for the summit, which Lavrov said would “strengthen the whole suite” of their relations.
The three Sahelian countries are led by juntas who seized power in coups and have turned away from former colonial power France while moving closer to Russia, which has been sending mercenaries to help them fight a transnational jihadist insurgency.
Lavrov said Russia was ready to help “strengthen the three countries’ combat capability” and train soldiers and law enforcement officers.
He added that Moscow could help the countries form a joint armed force “by organizing special courses, by using instructors who are already working in large numbers in the countries” and by “supplying military production.”
Mali’s Abdoulaye Diop said that Mali and Russia shared views on “fighting against terrorism.”
“We consider Ukraine as simply a terrorist state,” the minister said at a press conference.
Mali last year broke off diplomatic relations with Ukraine, accusing a senior Ukrainian official of having admitted Kyiv played a role in a heavy defeat suffered by Malian troops.
Niger then joined Mali in cutting diplomatic ties, accusing Kyiv of supporting “terrorist groups.”
Ukraine’s foreign ministry on Thursday rejected claims it had interfered in Mali’s affairs as “baseless,” and suggested Diop’s comments were unserious given he “represents an illegitimate junta that usurped power.”
Moscow has concluded defense agreements with Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger and supplied them with military equipment.


UK watchdog announces probe into Prince Harry charity

Updated 03 April 2025
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UK watchdog announces probe into Prince Harry charity

  • The watchdog added that it would be examining whether the charity’s current and former trustees had “fulfilled their duties and responsibilities under charity law“
  • The row at Sentebale escalated on Sunday after its chairperson Sophie Chandauka accused the prince of “bullying“

LONDON: The UK’s charity watchdog on Thursday opened a probe into Sentebale, the African organization co-founded by Prince Harry, after a bitter boardroom row led King Charles III’s younger son to step down as patron.
“After a period of assessing the initial concerns raised with the Commission, the regulator informed the charity on 2 April 2025 it has opened a regulatory compliance case,” the Charity Commission said in a statement.
The watchdog added that it would be examining whether the charity’s current and former trustees had “fulfilled their duties and responsibilities under charity law.”
The row at Sentebale escalated on Sunday after its chairperson Sophie Chandauka accused the prince of “bullying” and being involved in a “cover up.”

Earlier, Harry and Sentebale’s co-founder, Lesotho’s Prince Seeiso, announced their departure from the charity they established in 2006, following a “devastating” dispute between trustees and Chandauka.
Relations with Chandauka, who was appointed in 2023, “broke down beyond repair,” they said in a joint statement last week, prompting trustees to leave and demand that Chandauka resign.
Harry founded the charity in honor of his mother, Princess Diana, with Seeiso to help young people with HIV and AIDS in Lesotho and later Botswana.
The latest accusations are a fresh blow for the prince, who kept up only a handful of his private patronages including with Sentebale after a dramatic split with the British royals in 2020.
While Harry was integral to the founding vision of the charity, to which he once said he was “committed for the rest of my life,” Chandauka has said “Sentebale has a future” beyond the prince.
Harry chose the name Sentebale as a tribute to Diana, who died in a Paris car crash in 1997 when the prince was just 12. It means “forget me not” in the Sesotho language and is also used to say goodbye.