Report: Bin Laden courier's cellphone shows contacts with group tied to Pakistan

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Report: Bin Laden courier's cellphone shows contacts with group tied to Pakistan

intelligence

By The Associated Press | The Canadian Press – Fri, 24 Jun, 2011

WASHINGTON - A mobile phone of Osama bin Laden's trusted courier recovered in

the U.S. raid last month that killed both men in Pakistan contained contacts to

a militant group that is a longtime asset of Pakistan's intelligence agency, The

New York Times reported late Thursday.

In a story posted on the Times website, senior American officials and others

briefed on the findings said the discovery indicates bin Laden used the group,

Harakat-ul-Mujahedeen, as part of his support network inside Pakistan.

It raises questions about whether the group and others helped shelter and

support the al-Qaida leader on behalf of Pakistan's spy agency.

The officials and analysts told the Times that Pakistan's intelligence agency

had mentored Harakat and allowed it to operate in Pakistan for at least 20

years.

In tracing the calls on the cellphone, U.S. analysts have determined that

Harakat commanders had called Pakistani intelligence officials, the senior

American officials said. One said they had met. The officials added that the

contacts were not necessarily about bin Laden and that there was no " smoking

gun " showing that Pakistan's spy agency had protected bin Laden.

Beyond providing leads about why bin Laden was able to live comfortably for

years in Abbottabad, a town dominated by the Pakistani military just 35 miles

(56 kilometres) from the capital city of Islamabad, the discovery also may help

shed light on bin Laden's secret odyssey after he slipped away from U.S. forces

in the Tora Bora region of Afghanistan nearly 10 years ago.

Harakat has especially deep roots in the area around Abbottabad, analysts

familiar with the group told the Times. Its leaders have strong ties with both

al-Qaida and Pakistani intelligence, known as Inter-Services Intelligence.

The senior American officials did not identify the commanders whose numbers were

in the courier's cellphone but said the militants were in South Waziristan,

where al-Qaida and other groups had been based for years. Harakat's network

would have allowed bin Laden to pass on messages and money to Qaida members

there and in other parts of Pakistan's tribal areas, analysts and officials

said.

Bin Laden and his courier, Ibrahim Saeed Ahmed, were discovered by U.S.

intelligence through a chance interception of an Ahmed phone call. That set in

motion the secret CIA search of the Abbottabad region, culminating with the May

2 raid by Navy SEALs that killed bin Laden, Ahmed's brother Abrar and two other

people.

Reached by the AP on his mobile phone last month, Harakat chief Fazle-ur-Rahman

Khalil dismissed suggestions that he may have been in touch with bin Laden while

the al-Qaida leader was hiding in Abbottabad.

" It is 100 per cent wrong, it's rubbish, " Khalil said. " Osama did not have

contact with anybody. " The AP obtained Khalil's phone number from a former aide

who has since left the group.