- BEIJING (Reuters) - China
says it will not let attack suspect Osama bin Laden enter its territory
from neighbouring Afghanistan, where he is living.
-
- "I don't think this is a possibility," a
Chinese
Foreign Ministry spokesman said on Friday when asked if China would allow
bin Laden into the country.
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- The United States has named Saudi-born bin Laden as the
suspected mastermind of the devastating September 11 attacks on New York
and Washington with hijacked airliners.
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- U.S. President George W. Bush issued an ultimatum to
Afghanistan's Taliban regime on Thursday, saying they risked the same
punishment
as those they sheltered unless they handed over bin Laden and his senior
aides and closed all his training camps.
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- A gathering of clerics in Kabul ruled on Thursday that
the Taliban should ask bin Laden to leave of his own free will. The Taliban
ambassador to Pakistan told the Afghan Islamic Press news agency on Friday
that the Taliban could not force him to leave.
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- ___
- Osama Leaves Afghanistan
The Hindustan Times
9-21-1
-
- ISLAMABAD (PTI) -
International
mastermind Osama bin Laden has "silently" left Afghanistan for
an undisclosed destination, ahead of a meeting of Afghan Islamic clerics
to discuss whether to extradite him, a newspaper here reported on Friday
quoting sources close to Taliban and a former interior minister of
Pakistan.
-
- In a report from the north west former provincial town
of Peshawar, close to Afghanistan borders, The News said that Osama bin
Laden had left Afghanistan four days ago and was no longer on Afghan
soil.
-
- Taliban sources said their chief Mullah Omar, reluctantly
accepted the request of Osama to leave Afghanistan ahead of the 'shura'
in Kabul, which called on the Taliban government to persuade the Saudi
dissident to take refuge outside Afghanistan.
-
- "Osama has left Afghanistan four days ago and is
no longer in the country. I believe the news is not wrong. He must be out
of the Afghan soil," it quoted a Taliban official, who asked not to
be named, adding "Laden decided on his own to leave Afghanistan, given
the threats of the US government to attack the country."
-
- A former interior minister in the Pakistan Peoples' Party
(PPP) government Naseerullah Babar, also claimed that Osama had left
Afghanistan
four days ago, it said.
-
- Mullah Mohammad Omar had to give the required endorsement
to the Shura edict and that was why he took four days so that Osama could
get some time to leave Afghanistan, Babbar told reporters at
Nowshera.
-
- The paper, however, admitted that it could not confirm
its report from the Taliban leadership but said that informed sources among
the Taliban ranks did not deny his departure.
-
- Laden is reported to have left along with his trusted
lieutenants, mostly Arabs volunteers and few Afghans, said.
-
- "We do not know, which country Osama was heading
for, but the reports carry weight that he is no longer in
afghanistan,"
said the Taliban sources. "I am sure Mullah Omar will endorse the
resolution passed at the meeting of religious clerics in Kabul within days.
That means Osama has already left," said the source in
Pakistan.
-
- Diplomatic sources, however, said the Taliban may have
to produce more credible evidence to prove that Osama and his men have
left its soil. Till then it would continue to be in firing line. Also it
would be difficult to believe that he would leave his remote but safe
sanctuaries
in Afghanistan and risk capture or death anywhere else, they said.
-
- Taliban supreme leader, Mullah Muhammad Omar had turned
down an earlier request by Osama after the last US cruise missiles attack
on khost in Afghanistan, in 1998. Sources close to religious parties
believe
that Osama could have left for his hideouts in Lebanon or the remote
mountainous
region of Chechnya, it said.
-
- An Afghan national, known for his close links with Osama
bin Laden because of his time tested loyalty told The News that
"sheikh",
a reference to Osama, was in good health and surrounded by Arab youngsters,
who had pledged to to sacrifice their lives in pursuit of his defence,
the daily said.
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- Link
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- ___
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-
- Osama Reaches China Border?
- 9-21-1
-
- PESHAWAR - After the Shoora
decision, which concluded in the afternoon in Kabul, Osama Bin Laden has
reached the China border. According to an informed source on the Pak-Afghan
border, the Taleban officials rushed him towards the Chinese border and
left him there as till 1 o'clock he was in Afghanistan.
-
- It is worth mentioning here that much awaited Shoora
meeting, after thorough discussion on the issue of Osama Bin Laden, arrived
at the conclusion that he should leave Afghanistan in the current critical
situation.
-
- The source showed ignorance of Osama's whereabouts after
his approaching the China border.-PPI
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- Copyright 2001 PPI (Published under arrangement with
Pakistan Press International)
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