• Published 08:17 03.05.11
  • Latest update 08:17 03.05.11

U.S.: Bin Laden lived in Pakistan compound for at least 5 years

Obama's counterterrorism adviser John Brennan tells CBS the al-Qaida mastermind was living in mansion where he was killed for five to six years; U.S. trying to use new information found in compound to continue war on al-Qaida.

By Reuters Tags: Osama bin Laden

Osama bin Laden lived for the past five to six years in the compound deep inside Pakistan where the al-Qaida leader was killed by U.S. forces, President Barack Obama's counterterrorism adviser said on Tuesday.

Click here for full Haaretz coverage on the killing of Osama bin Laden.

Osama bin Laden - AP - Apri l1998

Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan, April 1998.

Photo by: AP

Bin Laden, who was living in Afghanistan before a 2001 U.S.-led invasion helped topple its Taliban regime, was holed up in a million-dollar mansion built especially for him in the military garrison town of Abbottabad in Pakistan before Sunday's operation to kill him.

"Well I think the latest information is that he was in this compound for the past five or six years and he had virtually no interaction with others outside that compound. But yet he seemed to be very active inside the compound," White House counterterrorism chief John Brennan said on the CBS Early Show program.

"And we know that he had released videos and audios. We know that he was in contact with some senior al-Qaida officials," Brennan added.

"So what we're trying to do now is to understand what he has been involved in over the past several years, exploit whatever information we were able to get at the compound and take that information and continue our efforts to destroy al-Qaida," Brennan added.

The fact that the al-Qaida chief had lived in the compound for such a long time has prompted some U.S. lawmakers to demand a review of the billions of dollars in aid the United States provides Pakistan, which is fighting a Taliban insurgency.
 

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