Reports of Bin Laden’s Death

The French Press paper L’est Republicain and the Hindustani Times are reporting of Osama Bin Laden’s death, this coming from leaked security memos that included information from Saudi Arabia intelligence services. France is investigating the leaks, but the memos report UBL dieing in Pakistan from Typhoid in late August. Article below:

 ubl2 Dead.jpg

 UBL DEAD! ?? Not

Les services secrets saoudiens auraient acquis la conviction que le fondateur d’Al-Qaïda est mort.

Chirac said he was “a bit surprised” at the leak and has asked Defense Minister Michele Alliot-Marie to probe how a document from a French foreign intelligence service was published in the French press.

 

The French Press paper L’est Republicain and the Hindustani Times are reporting of Osama Bin Laden’s death, this coming from leaked security memos that included information from Saudi Arabia intelligence services. France is investigating the leaks, but the memos report UBL dieing in Pakistan from Typhoid in late August. This might explain a few things, like Clinton’s recent rant, the funeral not fired upon report, and the recent tactics of the Taliban, which caused 1000-1500 Taliban deaths the past month. UPDATE: CNN carrying this story at 9:11 AM central. Update: Fox News now carrying the story. 11:40 central

Update: Un-named Saudi sources are quoted by Times.com as saying that UBL was ill etc., however Fox News just flashed a letter onscreen from the Saudi Government denying the report. Interesting, could this be another “faked intelligence memo” of the sort that tend to come out at election time? Is this an attempt by the left to sidetrack the issue of terrorism? The last two fake memos regarded Bush’s guard duty, and the yellow-cake plame affair; these past fakeries should by now have us suspicious at least. I will keep playing however, Osama is dead until proven otherwise.

Update: This quote from the Sauds: Saudi Arabia’s Interior Ministry offered no details. “I’ve heard the reports, but I have no information at all. I have no idea,” spokesman Mansour al-Turki told The Associated Press..

Final update: Journalists in India are accusing Pakistan’s ISI of planting the UBL story and memo.

 Hindustani Times Article below:

A French regional newspaper quoted a French secret service report on Saturday as saying that Saudi Arabia is convinced that Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden died of typhoid in Pakistan last month.  However, the French Defence Ministry has not confirmed the report. The ministry has also decided to probe the leak of classified document.

L’Est Republicain printed what it said was a copy of the report, dated September 21, and said it was shown to President Jacques Chirac, Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin and France’s interior and defence ministers on the same day.

“According to a usually reliable source, the Saudi services are now convinced that Osama bin Laden is dead,” the document said.

“The information gathered by the Saudis indicates that the head of Al-Qaeda was a victim while he was in Pakistan on August 23, 2006, of a very serious case of typhoid which led to a partial paralysis of his internal organs.”

The report, which was stamped with a “confidential defence” label and the initials of the French secret service, said Saudi Arabia first heard the information on September 4 and that it was waiting for more details before making an official announcement.

Officials contacted by Reuters in Chirac’s and Villepin’s offices had no immediate comment.

A senior official in Pakistan’s Interior Ministry said: “We have no information about Osama’s death.”

Saudi-born Bin Laden was based in Afghanistan until the Taliban government there was overthrown by US-backed forces in late 2001. Since then, US and Pakistani officials have regularly said they believe he is hiding somewhere on the rugged border between Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The last videotaped message released by bin Laden was in late 2004, but there have been several low quality audio tapes released this year.

This would explain a lot over the past month, including the changes in tactics the Taliban are taking, the new peace pact in Waziristan and other things. I do so hope it’s true.

 More from Yahoo News. The timing of the Clinton comments on Bin Laden now raise my eyebrows a tad, more at Captain’s Quarters.

From the Yahoo News article:

The regional newspaper l’Est Republicain on Saturday printed what it described as a copy of a confidential document from the DGSE intelligence service citing an uncorroborated report from Saudi secret services that the leader of the al-Qaida terror network had died.

The DGSE transmitted the document, dated Sept. 21 or Thursday, to Chirac and other top French officials, the newspaper said.

“This information is in no way whatsoever confirmed,” Chirac said Saturday when asked about the document. “I have no comment.”

In Washington, CIA duty officer Paul Gimigliano said he could not confirm the DGSE report.

The Washington-based IntelCenter, which monitors terrorism communications, said it was not aware of any similar reports on the Internet.

“We’ve seen nothing from any al-Qaida messaging or other indicators that would point to the death of Osama bin Laden,” IntelCenter director Ben N. Venzke told The Associated Press.

Al-Qaida would likely release information of his death fairly quickly if it were true, said Venzke, whose organization also provides counterterrorism intelligence services for the American government.

“They would want to release that to sort of control the way that it unfolds. If they wait too long, they could lose the initiative on it,” he said.

The last time the IntelCenter says it could be sure bin Laden was alive was June 29, when al-Qaida released an audiotape in which the terror leader eulogized the death of al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who was killed in a U.S. airstrike in Iraq earlier that month.

More at Gateway Pundit,  More at Planck’s Constant, where Bernie has translated the French article.

Contra-indicative report from Pakistan here and from My Way:

Pakistan has received no information from any foreign government that would corroborate a French newspaper report on Saturday that al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden died of typhoid in Pakistan, a senior government official said.

“No government has shared any such information with us so far, which is the normal thing to do under such circumstances,” the official, who has close knowledge of intelligence matters, said on condition of anonymity. A senior official in Pakistan’s Interior Ministry also said: “We have no information about Osama’s death.” The daily L’Est Republicain reported that, according to a French secret service report, Saudi Arabia was convinced that bin Laden died of typhoid in Pakistan in late August.

High-ranking diplomats in the Pakistani capital also doubted the French regional newspaper’s report. A US counterterrorism official was also unable to confirm the report.

“We cannot confirm the account,” said the official, who declined to be identified because he was not authorised to speak publicly about the issue.

This could be just a ploy to draw him out now that events have shaken and destabilized the region of Pakistan that he’s been hiding in. If that’s the case, then I’ll play and call him dead, since that could cause some good as well.