US: Bin Laden within our grasp

2004-09-04 10:07

Islamabad, Pakistan - The United States and its allies are moving closer to capturing Osama bin Laden, a top US counterterrorism official was quoted as saying by Pakistani newspapers on Saturday.

"Are we closer to getting Osama bin Laden? Yes," Joseph Cofer Black, the US State Department coordinator for counterterrorism, was quoted as saying by Dawn and The Nation, two English-language dailies.

Black, who briefed a group of Pakistani journalists after talks with officials here on Friday, said he could not predict exactly when bin Laden and other top al-Qaida fugitives would be nabbed.

It "could happen tomorrow, could happen a day after, a week from now, or a month from now. The thing is everything is in place. A little bit is needed to localize these people and to catch them," he said, according to Dawn.

Bin Laden and his top associate Ayman al-Zawahri are believed to be hiding some place along the long and rugged border between Pakistan and Afghanistan, although there appears to be no solid intelligence on their exact whereabouts.

Pakistan is a key ally of the United States in its war on terror, and Black's visit came weeks after Pakistani security forces captured Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani, a Tanzanian wanted for the 1998 US embassy bombings in east Africa, and Mohammed Naeem Noor Khan, a Pakistani computer expert allegedly linked to al-Qaeda operatives around the world.

The arrests led to a terror warning in the United States, and arrests in Britain and the United Arab Emirates.

Black attended a meeting of the Pakistan-US Joint Working Group on Counterterrorism and Law Enforcement in Islamabad on Thursday and Friday.

During the talks, Pakistan asked US officials for more helicopters, surveillance and communications equipment to help Pakistani forces guard border areas near Afghanistan "more efficiently," a Pakistani official at the talks said.

"We got a positive response from the American officials," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Pakistan has deployed about 70,000 troops along the Afghan border and conducted several military operations this year in its lawless tribal regions against al-Qaeda suspects and their local supporters.

- AP