Reported Post-9/11 Sightings of Osama
October 22, 2002 09:29 AM
Original Source: Forums at democraticunderground.comEwing2001 compiled this Bin Lad-o-Meter:
09/11/2001 Afghanistan, harboured by Taliban (US GOV, various sources)
09/12/2001 "Afghanistan's ruling Taliban movement said Saudi militant Osama bin Laden, taking shelter in Afghanistan, was not responsible for the terror attacks on the United States. "What happened in the United States was not a job of ordinary people. It could have been the work of governments. Osama bin Laden cannot do this work, neither us," Taliban spokesman Abdul Hai Mutmaen told Reuters from the southern city of Kandahar." (Hindustan Times)
09/13/2001 "...the most important thing for us is to find Bin Laden" (G. Bush)
09/28/2001 "...I have already said that I am not involved in the 11 September attacks in the United States. As a Muslim, I try my best to avoid telling a lie. I had no knowledge of these attacks, nor do I consider the killing of innocent women, children and other humans as an appreciable act." (Bin Laden in Ummat, khilafah.com)
10/07/2001 "...Bin Laden has four doubles to confuse western intelligence' (AFP Dubai)
10/29/2001 border area with Tajikistan (USA TODAY)
11/19/2001 between Kandahar and the Pakistan border nearby Chaman and Spin Balda (TIME)
11/21/2001 between Kabul and Kandahar (Telegraph UK)
11/22/2001 cave complexes in the Sur Ghar mountains east of Kandahar or a second region, in Tora Bora east of Jalalabad (NY POST)
11/22/2001 nearby border of Pakistan (AP)
11/23/2001 probably in Pakistan (India Reacts)
11/26/2001 area of Jalalabad (www.skynet.be)
11/27/2001 in caves of Tora Bora, next to Kandhar and Jalalabad (NBC, Bush warned, it might take "3-10 years" to find him)
11/29/2001 delivered food to the remote cave complex by mule convoy, close to the Khyber Pass and the Pakistan border (Sun UK)
11/29/2001 Tora Bora (Times UK)
12/1/2001 escape routes in the Khyber and Bajur areas, connected to ToraBora (EyeSpy Mag)
12/3/2001 caves of the Hada mountains, south-east of Kandahar, British elite force SAS missed him "by two hours" (Dawn)
12/6/2001 Melova/Tehelka, about 8 km west of Tora Bora (Tehelka.com)
12/7/2001 already in Pakistan, maybe in Somalia, or even in Europe (AIP), no longer in Kandahar (Mullah Omar, afgha.com)
12/7/2001 already left Tora Bora for the Spin Ghar mountain (NY POST)
12/7/2001 on one of 23 vessels on the sea with unknown locations (ABC)
12/8/2001 Osama was seen "yesterday", "riding back to Melawa after visiting his men on the front lines" (Commander Kalan Mir /Independent UK)
12/9/2001 in a cave fortress in Afghanistan (Al-Jazeera)
12/9/2001 escaped from Tora Bora and is now hiding in the forrest of Sping Ghar mountain (DER SPIEGEL) at Tahenka, some miles from ToraBora
12/13/2001 crossed into Pakistan "10 days ago" (Christian Science Monitor, but PakNews denied)
12/17/2001 officials "overheard bin Laden on handheld radio in the White Mountains" (TIME)
12/17/2001 in the snowy mountains of Tora Bora (Las Vegas News)
12/22/2001 Bin Laden is dead (Pentagon)
12/22/2001 Bin Laden could be dead (Reuters)
12/22/2001 "can be in Tora Bora" (Tommy Franks/Reuters)
12/27/2001 killed in Tora Bora or smuggled out of the country several weeks ago (Officials, EyeSpy Mag)
12/27/2001 alive and under protection by Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam in Pakistan (CNN)
12/27/2001 Pakistan, because of a new tape (MSNBC)
12/28/2001 Pakistan (Gulf-News)
12/28/2001 not in Tora Bora (Gulf-News)
12/28/2001 Peshawar/Pakistan (Myafghan.com)
12/28/2001 near the border with Pakistan (Qari Ahmadullah, the defeated Taliban's chief of intelligence, Myafghan.com)
12/28/2001 "he is either in Afghanistan or in some other country or dead" (Rumsfeld to scattered laughter, at the Pentagon)
12/28/2001 "He may be dead, he may be in Afghanistan, he may be in lots of places or Pakistan" (Rumsfeld, Baltimore Sun)
12/30/2001 supported by the Pakistani Secret Service ISI and maybe in Pakistan (Yunis Quanuni, Afghan interim minister)
12/31/2001 hiding in the Baghran area of Afghanistan's Helmand province (CNN)
1/1/2002 Iran (Reuters)
1/1/2002 boarded a boat in the vicinity of Gwader, Pakistan and made his way to eastern Hadhramaut region in Yemen (Wayne Madsen, Cryptome.org)
1/1/2002 boat trip to Arabia (Hadhramautis)
1/2/2002 inside Saudi Arabia (Prof. Nelson Valdés, Counterpunch)
1/4/2002 dressed in a Western suit and shaved, anywhere (ABC)
1/5/2002 Pakistan (Tribune India)
1/5/2002 Salt Lake city, USA (Salt Lake City News)
1/6/2002 Pakistan (MyAfghan.com)
1/6/2002 Tora Bora (US Forces/myafghan.com)
1/15/2002 fled the entire region by sea (ABC)
1/15/2002 has left Afghanistan and Pakistan (Vince Cannistraro/ABC)
1/16/2002 province A, B or C (Rumsfeld, Pentagon)
1/18/2002 CIA reacts angrily to an ABC news report that said they had confirmed Osama bin-Laden had escaped the region by boat (EyeSpy mag)
1/18/2002 Bin Laden is dead, victim of kidney failure (Musharraf/AP)
1/18/2002 declining to elaborate (US Intelligence, AP)
1/20/2002 he could be alive, he could be in Afghanistan, he could be somewhere else...or in Sudan, in Somalia, in Kashmir, in Chechnya, in southern Saudi Arabia, or on the Yemen border (Rumsfeld, Pentagon)
1/20/2002 hiding in Afghanistan (British Foreign Office, The Advertiser UK)
1/26/2002 Bin Laden still alive, escaped from ToraBora (Daily Telegraph)
2/2/2002 managed to escape Afghanistan via a southern coastal town in Iran formerly called Gwatar (EyeSpy Mag)
2/2/2002 left ToraBora (CIA, NY Times)
2/7/2002 CIA-drone missile 'might' have killed OBL (CNN)
2/11/2002 killed, CIA started to do DNA test on unidentified man (NY POST)
2/11/2002 still alive (Bob Graham, Richard Shelby, Senate Intelligence Committee , NY POST)
2/11/2002 "Mir Ahmad was a little tall. But he was not Osama bin Laden" (Wash Post, on man killed after being mistaken for ObL)
2/12/2002 "Can't even verify that we have bin Laden DNA" (ADM. STUFFLEBEEM, Pentagon)
2/12/2002 "It's impossible to answer the question" (ADM. STUFFLEBEEM, Pentagon)
2/12/2002 Bin Laden is dead (Musharraf/Reporter at Pentagon)
3/4/2002 escaped from Jalalabad (SCANT intelligence, Mercury.au)
3/5/2002 walking across the border into Pakistan, "We saw Osama while standing in front of our guesthouse at 9pm,"says Jalalabad resident Babrak Khan (Christian Science Monitor, Sunday Telegraph)
3/13/2002 "just doesn't think about the man" (President Bush)
3/19/2002 Bin Laden is alive, doing phone calls (Sheikh Ahmad, Bin Ladens half-brother, CNN)
3/29/2002 unknown internet cafe, sending emails (Times of India)
4/5/2002 "I have no idea...maybe he's dug in one of those holes (President Bush, AFP)
4/6/2002 "Our goal was never to catch bin Laden" (Gen. Richard Myers on CNN; Novak, Hunt, and Shields)
4/9/2002 Laden narrowly escaped US raid in Pak (Times of India)
4/9/2002 Stayed for three days in Faisalabad and was able to slip out of the town barely a few hours before the FBI conducted a surprise raid (The Nation/Pakistan)
4/9/2002 "he may or may not have", "some of the nazi war criminals weren't caught for years... they found them in South America" (on Bin Laden's email, Rumsfeld/Pentagon)
4/9/2002 Osama not holed up in Faisalabad (PakNews)
4/10/2002 OBL is "alive and well and "eager to work with his brothers" (ANSA Italy/Drudge Report/Al Hayat)
4/17/2002 UBL didn't escape to Pakistan, but "bin Laden's right-hand man, Abu Zubayda had been arrested in Pakistan" (PakNews)
4/24/2002 harbored in the slums of Peshawar (Dawn)
4/29/2002 able to escape the clutches of US troops in Afghanistan (Yahoo News)
5/5/2002 near a place called Maidan, a village north of Miram Shah inside Pakistan (Afghan chief of military intelligence in Khowst, Hazrat Uddin, MSNBC)
5/5/2002 Osama bin Laden is alive and recruiting fresh support in Britain and Europe (Dr Rohan Gunaratna, Sky.com, left message on akhbar-alyoum -website, ed: same guy later analysed the dog gassing tapes)
5/7/2002 seen in Pakistan in eastern city of Khost, trimmed his beard (Hazrat Uddin, military intelligence chief , Times of India)
5/17/2002 Bin Laden still alive in neighboring Pakistan (Mullah Omar, myafghan.com)
5/19/2002 alive in March, because seen on new video (AP)
5/22/2002 U.S. military may have captured bin Laden (Todd Clark/Wells Fargo Securities, AP)
6/12/2002 Bin Laden was killed before Sep11th (Stanley Hilton, lawyer)
6/23/2002 Osama bin Laden is to give another televised address to the world on July 4th, probably planning attack on Las Vegas (Sunday Mirror)
6/23/2002 alive and left notes for recorded audiotaped message from Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, tape monitored in Beirut, Lebanon. Meanwhile the al-Tawhid group around jordanian Abu Katadah takes response for attack in Djerba, Tunesia (Al-Jazeera )
6/30/2002 alive as of late December, but may also be buried at Ali Khel (CIA, AlertNet)
7/02/2002 Bin Laden is alive (Afghan Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdulla, Reuters)
7/15/2002 wounded in a U.S. bombing raid on Afghanistan in December but in good health. Spokeswoman Victoria Clarke said she was aware of the report "but we don't have anything to add to it." (London-based Al-Quds Al-Arab/Pentagon)
7/17/2002 Bin Laden is dead (Dale Watson, resigned from FBIHQ in August 2002)
7/29/2002 hiding in Pakistan, drawing an immediate denial from Islamabad. "Pakistani intelligence -- the ISI -- know where he is. General Musharraf is the commander in chief of the armed forces and the ISI reports to him." (India's defence minister Fernandes, AlertNet) "Indian propaganda" (Pervez Musharraf )
7/30/2002 Bin Laden alive, preparing attack, will appear in a videotape (UPI, Ash Sharq al-Awsat London). Bin Laden's son will help out soon and "three, four, five, six, seven people who could" too (Rumsfeld)
8/12/2002 fled the rugged Tora Bora region on horseback last December, cut through Pakistan and made his way to another Afghan mountain stronghold (NY POST)
8/18/2002 survived last year's U.S. bombing, "living in some remote part of the country (Afghanistan) or in a neighboring country" (Afghan foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah, Reuters)
8/20/2002 "...since bin Laden disappeared late last year he is rarely if ever mentioned by the President or his senior advisers ... (he is) killed in an Afghan cave or is still alive and in hiding" (ABC)
8/21/2002 Intelligence sources confirm bin Laden is dead. Osama bin Laden is dead and will be publicly pronounced so by the Bush administration just before the next presidential election in November 2004. "I have it from high level from inside the Bush administration...that bin Laden died of natural causes and that his family has given the body to the CIA." (Alex Jones, RedFlag)
8/26/2002 new letter by Bin Laden, he "wrote this message a few weeks ago": "I can tell from my place that these great venerations drawn around the super powers do not equal a mosquito wing." (islamonline.net/english/news/2002-08/26/article19.shtml)
8/27/2002 selling Bin Laden liquors (Xterror.com)
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Editor's Additions:8/27/2002 Oliver North: "Bin Laden Dead" (NY Times)
"[North] is convinced that Mr. bin Laden is dead, quite possibly buried beneath the rubble of an American airstrike in Afghanistan. 'I'm certain that Osama is dead,' Mr. North said, his certitude on this subject - and so many others - just about palpable. 'I'm convinced of it, absolutely. And so are all the other guys I stay in touch with.'
Original URL: http://www.nytimes.com/2002/08/27/books/27NORT.htmlAll the other guys he "stays in touch with"? Is North still one of THEM or what? His old buddy and fellow Iran-Contra fall guy, Poindexter, has a new job with the government, so is it a stretch to think that North himself has also returned - to a covert function?
The article is about North's new novel, set in the 1990s. The protagonist, a North-like character on the White House national security staff, crusades to stop an attack on America by a conspiracy headed by Saddam Hussein and Osama Bin Laden. But his main nemesis is a Clinton-like president, who restrains him (and endangers the country) with reckless talk of due process. To the Times, author North admits that he doesn't actually believe in a Saddam-Osama connection. But what the hell, it makes a good script. The first printing of the book, by a Christian publisher: 300,000 copies.10/19/2002 bin Laden reported in Saudi Arabia (www.debka.com)
"DEBKAfile reveals that the long-lost al Qaeda leader, Saudi-born Osama bin Laden, is alive and in Saudi Arabia. He is believed to have landed secretly at the end of September ... Two sightings of the elusive terrorist chief have now been reported – both in the wildest, most inhospitable regions of Saudi Arabia, the Rub al Khali, the Empty Quarter of the Arabian Peninsula, and Najran on the Yemen frontier."!