After killing kingpin, US questions ally Pakistan

The US warned it would probe Osama bin Laden’s support network in Pakistan, raising tough questions for its anti-terror ally after killing the Al-Qaeda kingpin in a daring raid.

Officials said DNA tests had proven conclusively that the man US special forces killed on Sunday in the city of Abbottabad was indeed their reviled foe blamed for the deaths of 3,000 people in the September 11 attacks in 2001.

They also revealed bin Laden was buried at sea after Islamic rites on the USS Carl Vinson aircraft carrier, as many world leaders welcomed his demise but warned it did not mean the challenge from terror was over.

Washington wanted to prevent any dry land grave site becoming a shrine for a man whose supporters now view as a martyr.

President Barack Obama’s top anti-terror adviser John Brennan said it was “inconceivable” bin Laden did not have a support network in Pakistan.

US officials are puzzled by the comfortable surroundings of the Abbottabad compound where bin Laden lived, and the fact that his presence in a fortified, upscale building did not attract Pakistani authorities’ suspicions.

In another sign of mistrust between Washington and Islamabad, Mr Brennan said US officials did not notify Pakistan of the raid until its helicopters exited Pakistani airspace with bin Laden’s remains.

World leaders welcomed the news but warned that Al-Qaeda’s willingness to wreak havoc was undimmed and that reprisal attacks were likely. Pakistan’s main Taliban faction threatened to attack Pakistan and the US, calling them “the enemies of Islam.”

“If he (bin Laden) has become a martyr, it is a great victory for us because martyrdom is the aim of all of us,” spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan told AFP by phone.

Hundreds took to the streets in Quetta, a Pakistani city believed to be home to the Afghanistan Taliban’s ruling council, in Pakistan’s first rally to honor bin Laden, burning a US flag and chanting anti-American slogans.

The exact circumstances of bin Laden’s final moments remained unclear. One official confirmed the Al-Qaeda leader was shot in the head, and some reports also suggested he took a round to the chest.

Footage aired by the US network ABC inside the house showed blood on the floor in one room and broken computers in another, stripped of their hard drives.

One helicopter in the raid went down due to “mechanical failure” but was blown up by its crew, who left the compound along with the assault force on another chopper, a US official said.