MONDAY, 02 MAY 2011 09:52
Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin LadenThe United States did not notify the Pakistani government about the US operation that killed al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, says a US official.
Late on Sunday, US President Barack Obama announced that bin Laden was killed by US forces after he was found hiding in a compound in Pakistan.
"We shared this intelligence on the compound with no other country, including Pakistan," the unnamed US official said, AFP reports.
The official added that the reason for not sharing intelligence with Islamabad was "the need to maintain complete secrecy" about the operation.
However, during his Sunday televised speech, the US president credited Islamabad's cooperation in tracking bin Laden.
"It is important to note that our counter-terrorism cooperation with Pakistan helped lead us to bin Laden and the compound where he was hiding," Obama said.
During the Sunday US operation that killed bin Laden, three other men -- including a son of the al-Qaeda leader -- and a woman were also killed.
"In addition to Osama bin Laden, three adult males were killed in the raid," another unnamed US official said earlier, adding that one of them was believed to be an adult son of bin Laden.
Two other women were also injured in the raid that lasted less than 40 minutes, the official added.
The announcement of bin Laden's death comes almost ten years after the September 11 attacks on the United States.
On September 11, 2001, a series of coordinated attacks were carried out in the United States, leaving almost 3,000 people dead.
During the incident, 19 reported "al-Qaeda terrorists" hijacked four commercial passenger jet airliners and crashed two of them into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, killing everyone on board and many others working in the buildings.
The hijackers crashed a third airliner into the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, just outside Washington, D.C.
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