TEHRAN, 29 February 2004 — Pentagon and Pakistani officials yesterday denied an Iranian state radio report that Osama Bin Laden was captured in Pakistan’s border region with Afghanistan “a long time ago.”
The claim came at a time when Pakistan’s army was hunting Al-Qaeda suspects in a remote tribal region along the border with Afghanistan, believed to be a possible hiding place for Bin Laden.
The report was carried by Iran radio’s external Pashtun service, which is designed for listeners in Afghanistan and Pakistan where the language is widely spoken.
Iran state radio’s main news channel — the Farsi-language service for Iranian listeners — did not carry the Bin Laden report. Iran state television also did not carry the report.
The director of Iran radio’s Pashtun service, Asheq Hossein, said he had two sources for the report. The radio quoted its reporter as saying Bin Laden had been in custody for a period of time, but a US announcement of the capture was being withheld by US President George W. Bush until closer to the November election.
“Osama Bin Laden has been arrested a long time ago, but Bush is intending to use it for propaganda maneuvering in the presidential election,” he said.
There have been reports that military forces believed they had identified Bin Laden’s general location and had him encircled, but Pakistani officials have denied any specific knowledge of Bin Laden’s whereabouts.
The state radio report, quoting an unnamed source, said US Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld’s visit to the region this week was in connection with the arrest.
Larry Di Rita, the chief Pentagon spokesman who traveled with Rumsfeld this week to Afghanistan, denied the report. “I don’t have any reason to think it’s true,” he said.
Pakistani Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed denied the reported capture, saying it was “baseless news.”
