U.S. Tells Pakistan to Name Agents

Obama administration has demanded the identities of some of their top intelligence operatives as the United States tries to determine whether any of them had contact with Osama bin Laden or his agents in the years before the raid that led to his death early Monday morning in Pakistan.

The officials provided new details of a tense discussion between Pakistani officials and an American envoy who traveled to Pakistan on Monday, as well as the growing suspicion among United States intelligence and diplomatic officials that someone in Pakistan’s secret intelligence agency knew of Bin Laden’s location, and helped shield him.

Obama administration officials have stopped short of accusing the Pakistani government — either privately or publicly — of complicity in the hiding of Bin Laden in the years after the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. One senior administration official privately acknowledged that the administration sees its relationship with Pakistan as too crucial to risk a wholesale break, even if it turned out that past or present Pakistani intelligence officials did know about Bin Laden’s whereabouts.

Still, this official and others expressed deep frustration with Pakistani military and intelligence officials for their refusal over the years to identify members of the agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate, who were believed to have close ties to Bin Laden. In particular, American officials have demanded information on what is known as the ISI’s S directorate, which has worked closely with militants since the days of the fight against the Soviet army in Afghanistan.

“It’s hard to believe that Kayani and Pasha actually knew that Bin Laden was there,” a senior administration official said, referring to Pakistan’s army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, and the ISI director-general, Lt. Gen. Ahmad Shuja Pasha. But, added the official, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the diplomatic sensitivity of the issue, “there are degrees of knowing, and it wouldn’t surprise me if we find out that someone close to Pasha knew.”

Already, Pakistani news outlets have been speculating that General Pasha, one of the most powerful figures in Pakistan, may step down as a consequence of the Bin Laden operation.

The increasing tensions between the United States and Pakistan — whose proximity to Afghanistan makes it almost a necessary ally in the American and allied war there — came as Al Qaeda itself acknowledged on Friday the death of its leader. The group did so while vowing revenge on the United States and its allies.

Pakistani investigators involved in piecing together Bin Laden’s life during the past nine years said this week that he had been living in Pakistan’s urban centers longer than previously believed.

Two Pakistani officials with knowledge of the continuing Pakistani investigation say that Bin Laden’s Yemeni wife, one of three wives now in Pakistani custody since the raid on Monday, told investigators that before moving in 2005 to the mansion in Abbottabad where he was eventually killed, Bin Laden had lived with his family for nearly two and a half years in a small village, Chak Shah Mohammad, a little more than a mile southeast of the town of Haripur, on the main Abbottabad highway.

In retrospect, one of the officials said, this means that Bin Laden left Pakistan’s rugged tribal region sometime in 2003 and had been living in northern urban regions since then. American and Pakistani officials had thought for years that ever since Bin Laden disappeared from Tora Bora in Afghanistan, he had been hiding in the tribal regions straddling the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.

A former Pakistani official noted that Abbottabad, the site of the Pakistani equivalent of the West Point military academy, is crawling with security guards and military officials who established a secure cordon around the town, raising questions of how the officials could not know there was a suspicious compound in their midst.

“If he was there since 2005, that is too long a time for local police and intelligence not to know,” said Hassan Abbas, a former Pakistani official now teaching at Columbia University.

Mr. Abbas said there was a tight net of security surrounding Abbottabad because Pakistani officials were concerned about terrorist attacks on sensitive military installations in the area.

Art Keller, a former officer of the Central Intelligence Agency who worked on the hunt for Bin Laden from a compound in the Waziristan region of Pakistan in 2006, said the Qaeda founder’s choice of the garrison town of Abbottabad as a refuge in 2005 raised serious questions. Bin Laden certainly knew of the concentration of military institutions, officers and retirees in the town — including some from the ISI’s S directorate, Mr. Keller said. And because the military has also been a target of militant attacks in recent years, the town has a higher level of security awareness, checkpoints and street surveillance than others.

If Bin Laden wanted to relocate in a populated area of Pakistan to avoid missiles fired from American drones, Mr. Keller said, he had many choices. So Mr. Keller questioned why Bin Laden would live in Abbottabad, unless he had some assurance of protection or patronage from military or intelligence officers. “At best, it was willful blindness on the part of the ISI,” Mr. Keller said. “Willful blindness is a survival mechanism in Pakistan.”

The trove of information taken by the commandos from the compound occupied by Bin Laden may answer some of these questions, and perhaps even solve the puzzle of where he has been in recent years.

A senior law enforcement official said Friday that the F.B.I. and C.I.A. had rapidly assembled small armies of analysts, technical experts and translators to pore over about 100 thumb drives, DVDs and computer disks, along with 10 computer hard drives, 5 computers and assorted cellphones. Analysts are also sifting through piles of paper documents in the house, many of which are in Arabic and other languages that need to be translated.

In Washington and New York alone, several hundred analysts, technical experts and other specialists are working round the clock to review the trove of information. “It’s all hands on deck,” said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the continuing investigation.

Technical specialists are recovering phone numbers from several cellphones recovered at the compound. The experts need to distinguish foreign telephone contacts from any numbers in the United States, which undergo a separate legal review, the official said.

“We’re also looking through notes, letters, e-mails and other communications,” the official said. “We’re looking at who owns the e-mails and what linkages there are to those people.” The official said that the initial analysis would involve searching for information about specific threats or plots, or potential terrorists sent to the United States or Europe, and that the F.B.I. was pursuing a small number of leads from the information reviewed so far.

Obama thanks, awards team in bin Laden raid

New York Times

They are the shadowy warriors of the raid that killed Osama bin Laden: two dozen members of the Navy Seals who stormed the fortified compound in Pakistan where Bin Laden was hiding. Their identities will probably never be known; their faces will most likely never appear in photographs at the White House, on magazine covers or on television talk shows.

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But on Friday, President Obama flew to this Army air base to thank them, behind closed doors, for what he called a “job well done,” describing it as one of the greatest military and intelligence operations in American history.

“This has been an historic week for the life of our nation,” Mr. Obama said later to a raucous rally of 2,300 soldiers, many of them just returned from Afghanistan. “The terrorist leader who struck our nation on 9/11 will never threaten America again.”

During the meeting with the Seal team — which Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. also attended — Mr. Obama awarded it and other units involved in the operation with a Presidential Unit Citation, the White House said. The president also received a PowerPoint presentation on the raid, with maps, photos and a scale model of the compound, from members of the assault force. Even the trained dog used in the raid attended.

The White House released few other details of the meeting, and did not mention the highly classified members of the unit by name. But Mr. Biden mentioned them several times in his speech, telling the soldiers that earlier in the day, his granddaughter exclaimed, “My Pop is going out to see the whales!”

The public rally and the private meeting amounted to a choreographed victory lap for Mr. Obama near the end of a momentous week that began with his announcement on Sunday that commandos had killed Bin Laden.

On Thursday, Mr. Obama visited ground zero in New York and met with relatives of the victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, drawing a personal link between the killing of Bin Laden and the deaths his disciples inflicted on nearly 3,000 people at the World Trade Center.

Speaking under a giant American flag to the troops of the 101st Airborne Division, Mr. Obama drew another connection, between the soldiers there and the commandos he called “America’s quiet professionals.”

“Like all of us, they could have chosen a life of ease,” the president said. “But like you, they volunteered.”

Describing the Seal commandos as “battle hardened” and tirelessly trained, Mr. Obama said: “When I gave the order, they were ready. And in recent days, the world has learned just how ready they were.”

While the Seal team is not based here, Fort Campbell is home of the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, known as the Night Stalkers. The unit, which pilots aircraft for Special Operations troops, flew the helicopters that carried the commandos to Bin Laden’s compound.

Mr. Obama also linked the killing of Bin Laden to the broader war, saying it showed the progress that the United States had made in disrupting and dismantling Al Qaeda. The soldiers of the 101st Airborne, he said, were pushing back insurgents and allowing Afghans to reclaim their towns.

“The bottom line is this,” he said in a statement that drew the loudest cheers of the day, “our strategy is working, and there is no greater evidence of that than justice finally being delivered to Osama bin Laden.”

Among the soldiers, there was satisfaction, if not jubilation, at the killing of Bin Laden. Several said they were relieved, though most said they did not believe it would bring the Afghan war to an end any sooner.

“It helps to know that we finally got him,” said Sgt. Marion Githens, who coordinated Army helicopters at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan before returning to the United States two days ago. But she said she was still ambivalent about the war. “Some days, you feel like it’s not going anywhere,” she said. “Other days, you think, O.K., maybe we really can help these people.”

Still, other soldiers expressed gratitude that Mr. Obama had come. “It’s tough coming home,” said Capt. Jimos Reese, a company commander. “It does mean a lot that the president cares about you.”

It was Mr. Obama’s first visit to Fort Campbell, which is accustomed to visits by the commander in chief: six have come since the Vietnam War, with former President George W. Bush making three visits, including one just after Mr. Obama was elected in 2008.

The Pentagon recommended that Mr. Obama come to Fort Campbell, a senior official said, because the soldiers of the 101st Airborne had taken significant casualties, having served in a Taliban stronghold south and west of Kandahar that is some of the most lethal terrain in Afghanistan.

Mr. Obama acknowledged that service, noting that 125 soldiers from the base had died in Afghanistan. Some of the troops in the 101st Airborne, he said, had been deployed to Afghanistan three or four times.

Among those who greeted Mr. Obama at Fort Campbell was Vice Adm. William H. McRaven, a former commando in the Seals who oversaw the raid as the commander of the Joint Special Operations Command. After Mr. Obama’s arrival, the president’s motorcade left immediately for low buildings on the far side of the airfield, where the meeting with the Seal team and other units lasted more than an hour.

For all the celebration, there was still a somber tinge to Mr. Obama’s words, as he told the troops about a letter he had received from Payton Wall, a 14-year-old girl from New Jersey who wrote to him after hearing that Bin Laden was dead, about the devastating loss of her father in the 2001 terrorist attacks.

She stood near Mr. Obama on Thursday, with her mother and sister, as he laid a wreath at the 9/11 memorial plaza.

“Every year, more and more, Payton is shining through,” he said, describing how she plays lacrosse and mentors students. “For her and for all of us, this week has been a reminder of what we’re about as a people.”

Afghan women risk death to learn

Women in Kandahar, Afghanistan meet in secret, huddling in cramped, sweltering underground classrooms at great risk to themselves from the Taliban, in order to learn to read and fulfill their ambitions.

UN urges Bahrain to free detained activists

The United Nations human rights chief has called for Bahrain to free activists it has seized since crushing anti-government protests and for an independent probe into allegations of torture.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay's remarks on Thursday were the sharpest international criticism yet of the crackdown in Bahrain where the Sunni-led government has arrested hundreds from its Shia Muslim majority since the protests began.

"All political detainees must be immediately released and all detainees must have prompt access to legal counsel," Pillay said in a statement.

"My office has also received reports of severe torture against human rights defenders who are currently in
detention... There must be independent investigations of these cases of death in detention and allegations of torture."

At least four people have died in detention, and rights groups have criticised death sentences handed out last week to four men accused of killing policemen in March during protests that began with calls for more political liberties in the kingdom.

The defendants in that case were accused of running down two policemen with a car in March.

Also on Thursday, one man was sentenced to at least five years in jail and another was acquitted. State media earlier said they were accused of trying to kill security personnel by running them over.

At least 13 protesters and four police died in the unrest. Bahrain has said about 400 of those detained will face prosecution, some in a military court that last week handed down the first death sentence to a Bahraini citizen since the mid-1990s, also a period of sectarian-tinged political turmoil.

'No legal defence'

Families of the condemned men and rights groups say the court, which also sentenced three men to life in prison, kept the defendants from meeting lawyers and mounting any defence.

"The application of the death penalty without due process and after a trial held in secrecy is illegal and absolutely unacepptable," Pillay said.

The UN statement said more than 1,000 may have been detained, and the whereabouts of 50 of them are unknown.

New York-based Human Rights Watch said in a statement on Wednesday that it had received credible reports that a detained human rights activist, Abdulhadi al-Khawaja, had been hospitalised following beatings while in custody.

Amnesty International also appealed on Wednesday to Bahrain's rulers to bring an end to a campaign of arrests against its opponents while denouncing the extension of emergency rule in response to protests.

"The Bahraini authorities must stop detaining anyone who opposes them and release protesters who have been locked up for peacefully demanding reform," said Philip Luther, Amnesty's deputy director for the Middle East and North Africa.

"Even since the protests on the streets were violently crushed in mid-March the government's persecution of dissidents has not abated, while the renewal of the so-called 'State of National Safety' will only exacerbate this human rights crisis."

Pak Govt. ‘high levels’ knew whereabouts of Bin Laden: Carl Levin

Sen. Carl Levin said 'high levels' of the Pakistani government knew where Osama bin Laden was hiding, must know where Mullah Omar is too.

The Senate Armed Services Committee, Levin said, has already started a preliminary investigation into Pakistan's involvement and, depending on the results of that investigation, will decide whether to hold public hearings to investigate further.

"We need these questions answered about whether or not the top level of the Pakistan government knew or was told by the ISI, their intelligence service, about anything, about this suspicious activity for five years in a very, very centralized place," Levin said.

Beyond his suspicions about Pakistan's role in harboring bin Laden, Levin said he has "no doubt" that the highest levels of the Pakistani government are protecting other terrorist targets -- such as Taliban leader Mullah Omar and the leaders of the Haqqani terror network -- who have been responsible for the deaths of American troops in Afghanistan.

"These people are killing us. Killing our Afghan allies. Killing our coalition partners by crossing the border," Levin said. "They're being given a safe haven in Pakistan. So the government of Pakistan is going to continue to say they didn't know bin Laden was there. It's kind of hard to believe that higher-level people didn't know, but they'll continue to say that. But what they won't say is that they don't know where the Haqqani terrorists are because they do know, and they've told us they know."

'Bahraini women sexually assaulted'

Saudi-backed forces in Bahrain have sexually assaulted women during attacks to arrest human rights activists in the country, a new report reveals.


A Bahraini woman identified as Fatima, a close relative of prominent Bahraini rights activist Abdulhadi al-Khawaja, said she was sexually assaulted by Saudi-backed forces in her house, Press TV reported.

The regime forces assaulted Fatima after storming into her house to arrest her husband, she said in an interview accompanied by rights activist Zainab al-Khawaja.

Zainab, the daughter of Abdulhadi al-Khawaja, ended a 10-day hunger strike after international activists said they needed her to speak up for those detained in the crackdown.

Her father was arrested earlier in April.

Bahraini forces have arrested hundreds of activist so far during the clampdown on peaceful protests.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay has voiced "deep concern" about the continued detention of activists in the country.

Pillay also cited the prosecution of scores of medical professionals, and the death sentence handed down to four protesters after a closed-door military trial, said UN spokesperson Farhan Haq.

Anti-government protesters have been holding peaceful demonstrations across Bahrain since mid-February, calling for an end to the over-40-year rule of the Al Khalifa dynasty.

On March 14, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates deployed police and military forces in the kingdom at Manama's request to help quell the nationwide protests.

According to local sources, scores of people have been killed and hundreds arrested so far during the clampdown on peaceful protests.

The foreign deployments are reported to have contributed to a rise in the violence against the protesting public.

Recent reports say Riyadh is sending more troops to Bahrain ahead of planned anti-government rallies there.

Syria protests: Baniyas fear amid Deraa pullout reports

Syrian activists are preparing to take to the streets on Friday for what they are calling a "day of defiance".

Tanks are reported to have withdrawn from the city of Deraa, where a human rights groups says the government has carried out a 10-day "massacre".

But security forces are reported to have gathered in other urban areas, including the coastal town of Baniyas.

More than 500 Syrians are thought to have been killed during attempts to quell seven weeks of protests.

At least 2,500 others have been detained as part of a violent crackdown that the US has described as "barbaric".

'Total disgust'

In cities across Syria protesters are calling for greater political rights and personal freedoms. Some are calling for the downfall of the regime of President Bashar al-Assad.

People are expected to gather again after prayers on Friday, which have become a regular focal point for protests in the Arab world in 2011.

The unrest in Syria poses the most serious challenge to four decades of rule by the Assad family in one of the Arab world's most tightly controlled countries.

Foreign journalists are not allowed to enter the country, so it is difficult to verify the reports of deaths.

One doctor, who said he planned to join those demonstrating, said the "indiscriminate killings and inhumane arrests have generated total disgust among the average Syrian".

"Soldiers with rifles no longer deter people. The propaganda that this regime is the only guarantor of stability no longer washes," he was quoted as telling Reuters.
'Preparing to attack'

Military units were reported to be deploying elsewhere on Thursday, including around the coastal town of Baniyas, home to one of Syria's two oil refineries.

Four armoured personnel carriers, several tanks and a bus carrying soldiers were seen by one eyewitness quoted by the Associated Press.Hundreds of families were said to be fleeing the area, fearing that Banias - like the city of Deraa - could come under siege.

"It looks like they are preparing to attack the town, like they did in Deraa," one activist told the AFP news agency by telephone from the town.

A UN humanitarian team is expected to visit Deraa in the coming days, the organisation's deputy spokesman Farhan Haq said on Thursday, following an appeal to President Bashar al-Assad by Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

Over the past two days there has also been an increased military presence also in the coastal towns of Homs and Rastan. Troops have also gathered in the Damascus suburbs of Erbin, Saqba, Douma and in the town of Tel, north of the capital.

In Washington, state department spokesman Mark Toner said the US continues to "press Assad's regime to desist in its violent behaviour".

"We abhor the violence there," Mr Toner said. "I think I called it barbaric, the measures that were taken the other day against the citizens of Deraa, and we urge Syria to end these kinds of actions against innocent civilians who are simply expressing their aspirations for a democratic future."

The Damascus Center for Human Rights Studies says snipers and anti-aircraft machine guns were used to fire on unarmed civilians in the southern city and recent amateur video appears to show dozens of unarmed protesters being shot and bleeding to death on the streets.

It has labelled the killings in Deraa a "massacre".

The government says it is taking action against "elements of terrorist groups... to restore security, peace and stability".

CIA watched bin Laden from nearby safe house inside Pakistan

Extensive surveillance of Osama bin Laden's hideout from a nearby CIA safe house in Abbottabad led to his killing in a Navy SEAL operation, U.S. officials said, a revelation likely to further embarrass Pakistan's spy agency and strain ties.

The U.S. officials, quoted by the Washington Post, said the safe house was the base for intelligence gathering that began after bin Laden's compound was discovered last August, and which was so exhaustive the CIA asked Congress to reallocate tens of millions of dollars to fund it.

"The CIA's job was to find and fix," the Post quoted one U.S. official as saying, using special forces terminology for locating a target. "The intelligence work was as complete as it was going to be, and it was the military's turn to finish the target."

U.S. officials told the New York Times that intelligence gathered from computer files and documents seized at his compound showed bin Laden had for years orchestrated al Qaeda attacks from the Pakistani town, and may have been planning a strike on the U.S. rail sector this year, the 10th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks.

One U.S. official said there was no indication from the intelligence that further plans were drawn up for the railway plot or that steps were taken to carry it out. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security said it had no information of an imminent threat.

The fact bin Laden was found in a garrison town -- his compound was not far from a major military academy -- has embarrassed Pakistan and the covert raid by U.S. commandos has angered its military.

On Thursday, the Pakistan army threatened to halt counter-terrorism cooperation with the United States if it conducted another, similar unilateral strike.

A major Islamist party in Pakistan, Jamaat-e-Islami, called for mass protests on Friday against what it called a violation of sovereignty by the U.S. raid. It also urged the government to end support for U.S. battles against militants.

A senior Pakistani security official also charged that U.S. troops had killed the unarmed al Qaeda leader in "cold blood".

The criticism from Pakistan is likely to fray a relationship that Washington deems vital to defeating al Qaeda and winning its war in neighboring Afghanistan.

A U.S. acknowledgment that bin Laden was unarmed when shot in the head -- as well as the sea burial of his body, a rare practice in Islam -- have also drawn criticism in the Arab world and Europe, where some have warned of a backlash.

Few Americans appear to have any qualms about how bin Laden was killed, and on Thursday, scores of people cheered President Barack Obama during a visit to New York's Ground Zero, site of the twin towers al Qaeda leveled on September 11, 2001, to comfort a city still scarred by attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people.

Obama said the killing of bin Laden "sent a message around the world, but also sent a message here back home, that when we say we will never forget, we mean what we say.

FRAYED TIES

Friction between Washington and Pakistan has focused on the role of Pakistan's top security service, the ISI or Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate.

Foreign Secretary Salman Bashir denied Pakistani forces or the ISI aided al Qaeda. "The critique of the ISI is not only unwarranted, it cannot be validated," he said.

Lobbyists for Pakistan in Washington have launched an intense campaign on Capitol Hill to counter accusations that Islamabad deliberately gave refuge to bin Laden.

But many Americans are questioning how the al Qaeda leader could live for years in a Pakistani town teeming with military personnel, 50 km (31 miles) from the capital Islamabad. Two U.S. lawmakers have also complained about the billions in U.S. civilian and military aid to impoverished Pakistan.

Seeking to repair ties, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in Rome on Thursday that Washington was still anxious to maintain its alliance with Islamabad.

The Pakistani army and spy agency have supplied intelligence to the United States, arrested al Qaeda figures and taken on militants in areas bordering Afghanistan.

"It is not always an easy relationship," Clinton said. "But, on the other hand, it is a productive one for both our countries and we are going to continue to cooperate between our governments, our militaries, our law-enforcement agencies."

Pakistan's army, facing rare criticism at home over the U.S. operation, warned the United States it would risk this cooperation if it conducted another assault.

Chief of Staff General Ashfaq Kayani "made it clear that any similar action violating the sovereignty of Pakistan will warrant a review on the level of military/intelligence cooperation with the United States", the army said.

It was unclear if such attacks included drone strikes which the U.S. military regularly conducts against militants along Pakistan's border with Afghanistan. Pakistan has denied harboring any members of al Qaeda.

The army also said it would conduct an investigation into failures by its intelligence to detect the world's most wanted man in its own backyard.

CIA SURVEILLANCE

The CIA had spent several months monitoring bin Laden's hideout, watching and photographing residents and visitors from a rented house nearby, according to U.S. officials quoted in the New York Times and Washington Post.

Observing from behind mirrored glass, CIA officers used cameras with telephoto lenses and infrared imaging equipment to study the compound, and they used sensitive eavesdropping equipment to try to pick up voices from inside the house and to intercept cellphone calls, the New York Times said. A satellite used radar to search for possible escape tunnels.

The U.S. administration has refused to be drawn on details on the raid, but, in a further sign of fractious relations between the allies, senior Pakistani security officials told Reuters that U.S. accounts had been misleading.

In Washington, people familiar with the latest U.S. government reporting on the raid told Reuters on Thursday that only one of four principal targets shot to death by U.S. commandos was involved in any hostile fire.

As the elite Navy SEALs moved in on a guest house inside bin Laden's compound, they were met with fire and shot a man in the guest house. He proved to be Abu Ahmed al-Kuwaiti, an al Qaeda courier U.S. intelligence agencies had long been tracking.

The commandos then entered the main residence, where they killed another courier and a son of bin Laden, the sources said. They finally shot and killed the al Qaeda leader in a top-floor room after having earlier fired at him as he poked his head out of a door or over a balcony.

U.S. officials originally spoke of a 40-minute firefight. The White House has blamed the "fog of war" for the changing accounts.

Obama in NY: We never forget, we mean what we say

Solemnly honoring victims of the Sept. 11 terror attacks, President Barack Obama hugged survivors, thanked the heroes of one of the nation's darkest days and declared Thursday that the killing of Osama bin Laden after all these years was an American message to the world: "When we say we will never forget, we mean what we say."

On a brilliant blue-sky day, one of reflection more than celebration, Obama offered New Yorkers a moment of their own. Standing at the gritty construction site of ground zero, where the towers fell and a memorial now rises, the president laid a wreath of red, white and blue flowers for the nearly 3,000 who died as he marked a turning point for the nation and this city of steely resilience.

For Obama, the day was about the importance of being in New York in the aftermath of the successful raid to find and kill bin Laden, the al-Qaida leader. Obama addressed families who have watched and wondered for nearly a decade whether the government would track down its most infamous enemy.

On this special ground, Obama never mentioned bin Laden's name.

Still, this was where the terrorist inflicted his greatest damage on a similarly sunny day in 2001 when hijacked airliners were crashed into the World Trade Center. Nearly 200 other people died when a third airliner hit the Pentagon — Vice President Joe Biden led a ceremony there on Thursday, and Bush Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld attended — and others were killed when yet a fourth plane crashed in Pennsylvania.Enthusiastic, emotional New Yorkers waited on streets to see the president, but there were few displays like the more raucous exuberance of a few days earlier. There were happy faces, shouts of "USA! USA!" and flags waved in the crowd, but there also was heavy security and most people were cordoned off blocks from where the president could be seen.Referring to the daring U.S. raid to take down bin Laden in Pakistan, Obama said of all those who died on Sept. 11: "It says we keep them in our hearts. We haven't forgotten."

Days after the attacks, President George W. Bush stood here with firefighters and a bullhorn. There was a different feel a decade later as another president paid his respects. Obama met with firefighters, then police, before having a solemn moment at ground zero and meeting privately with families of those who died.

"This is a symbolic site of the extraordinary sacrifice that was made on that terrible day," the president said at Engine 54, Ladder 4, Battalion 9. The firehouse in New York's theater district lost 15 firefighters on 9/11. The fire crews gave him hearty applause.

Obama said the American pursuit of the terrorist leader "sent a message around the world but also sent a message here back home that when we say we will never forget, we mean what we say, that our commitment to making sure that justice is done is something that transcended politics, transcended party."

Bin Laden was shot dead in a raid on his Pakistan compound early Monday in Pakistan, the result of years of painstaking intelligence work and a covert military mission in which none of the U.S. commandos was killed.

The president closed his eyes and clasped his hands at the outdoor memorial where the twin towers of the World Trade Center once dominated the Manhattan skyline.

60 stories high. Mammoth fountains and reflecting pools mark the footprints of the fallen towers. Now the nearby skyline is filled with construction machinery. The emerging skyscraper informally known as Freedom Tower is more than

Obama spoke with children who lost parents and adults who lost spouses. As he bowed his head, a jetliner screamed by, far overhead.

The president also peppered his brief comments with reminders of the challenges ahead, and his call for a new spirit of national unity.

It wasn't a moment for celebrating the military operation that killed bin Laden; that may come Friday, when the president visits Fort Campbell, Ky., home to the Army unit involved in transporting Navy SEALS in and out of bin Laden's compound. White House officials said Obama intended to privately thank participants in the raid.

Obama said Thursday he hoped the results of the raid on bin Laden's compound showed that "we did what we said we were going to do, and that Americans, even in the midst of tragedy, will come together, across the years, across politics, across party, across administrations, to make sure that justice is done."

Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who led the city in the days after the attacks, joined Obama during the day.

Obama invited Bush to join him Thursday in New York, but the former president declined.

Obama's visit came as new details emerged of the operation on bin Laden's Pakistan compound.

A senior defense official said Thursday that only one of the five people killed in the raid was armed and fired a shot — an account that differed from original administration portrayals of an intense firefight. The White House also now says bin Laden was unarmed when he was shot, after officials initially said the terrorist was holding a gun or even firing.

Obama also addressed bin Laden's burial at sea, saying in an interview with CBS' "60 Minutes" that: "Frankly, we took more care on this than, obviously, bin Laden took when he killed 3,000 people."

Such details perhaps mattered little to New Yorkers who suffered most grievously in the attacks and are now deeply gratified to see bin Laden's demise.

Ahead of Obama's arrival, Deanne McDonald stood at the northeast corner of the World Trade Center site waving an American flag in each hand and shouting "Obama got Osama! Obama got Osama!"

"God bless the Navy SEALS," said McDonald, 38, from Brooklyn. She took work off on Thursday to wait for the president, saying she was prouder than ever to be an American.

___

Bill presented in the US House to stop Pakistan aid

No US assistance can be provided to Pakistan unless the Obama administration certifies to Congress that Pakistan did not have any information about Osama bin Laden’s whereabouts, says a bill introduced in the House of Representatives.

The bill has been referred to the House Committee on Foreign Affairs but a growing number of both Republican and Democratic lawmakers are urging their colleagues not to take decisions that may hurt US interests.

“Congress has already appropriated $3 billion in aid to Pakistan for this year,” said Congressman Ted Poe, a Texas Republican, while introducing the bill. “Unless Pakistan can prove that they were not providing sanctuary for America ‘s number one enemy, they should not receive any American aid.”

Co-sponsors – Congressmen Vern Buchanan, John Culberson, and Allen West, all Republicans – also want to “punish” Pakistan but many see it as a hasty move.

“It is not the time to back away from Pakistan but rather a time to strengthen ties,” said House Speaker John Boehner. “It’s premature’ to talk of cutting aid, we both benefit from having a strong bilateral relationship.”

At a hearing on Pakistan in the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations on Thursday, Senator John Kerry urged lawmakers to think what impact their move to stop aid will have.

“Will the forces of violent extremism grow more dominant, eventually overpowering the moderate majority?” he asked. “Or will Pakistanis recommit to building a stable, moderate democracy?”

John McCain, the senior Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, warned: “There is a lot at stake there we need to do what we can to help that country.”

Ignoring such concerns, HR 1699 clearly states that US assistance may not be provided to Pakistan “under any provision of law” unless the Secretary of State certifies to Congress that: “(1) the government of Pakistan did not have any information regarding Osama bin Laden’s possible whereabouts on or after Sept. 11, 2001; or (2) if the government of Pakistan did have information regarding Osama bin Laden’s possible whereabouts on or after Sept. 11, 2001, it communicated such information to the United States government in an expedited manner.”

The secretary is required to submit a certification in writing and in unclassified form, but it may contain a classified annex if necessary.

This act shall take effect on the date of its enactment and shall apply to amounts allocated for assistance to Pakistan that are unexpended on or after such date.

But a Republican senator, Lindsey Graham, warned the lawmakers not to haste. “You cannot trust them and you cannot abandon them,” he said.

Co-sponsor Allen West, is not convinced. “Unless we get a clear explanation of what Pakistan knew about the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden, all foreign aid from American taxpayers to this nation needs to cease.”

Some Democrats also to suspend aid now. “Before we send another dime, we need to know whether Pakistan truly stands with us in the fight against terrorism,” said Democratic Senator Frank Lautenberg.

Congressman Dan Burton, co-chairman of the Congressional Pakistan Caucus, urged such lawmakers to “take a breath, take a look at US interests in the long term [and] take a look at the big picture,” he said.

House Armed Services Chairman Buck McKeon said, “I think people who have been married 30 years still have some problems, but they don’t get divorced.”

Congressman Ruppersberger, the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, argued that “just like we needed Turkey to go into Iraq , Pakistan remains the primary supply route for US forces in Afghanistan .”

Senator Claire McCaskill, another Democrat, said: “We have to be really careful here. We have to go through Pakistan to supply our troops. They have nuclear capability. They are in a very dangerous part of the world.”

Osama no martyr, but mass killer of Muslims

al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden, who was shot dead in his hideout by Special US forces in Pakistan, was a "mass killer of Muslims than anyone else and not a martyr as a few people are trying to portray," Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has said.
In her remarks to the National Conference of Editorial Writers, Clinton said the State Department is now working on a narrative "that will convince people he was a murderer, not a martyr."
Noting that bin Laden had tremendous sway with so many impressionable people in many parts of the world, Clinton said the US is already seeing something of an effort by the al-Qaeda remnants to decide who comes next.
"Any succession crisis provides an opportunity. A lot of people say al-Zawahiri will step into it. But that's not so clear. He doesn't have the same sense of loyalty or inspiration or track record," Clinton said.
"So I think his death, his removal from the leadership, along with two very important points that need to be remembered is that Taliban did not give up al-Qaeda when President (George) Bush asked them to after 9/11, because of Mullah Omar's personal relationship with bin Laden. That's gone, so I think it opens up possibilities for dealing with the Taliban that did not exist before," she hoped.
Clinton said the effort to stop al-Qaeda and its syndicate of terror will not end with the death of bin Laden.
"In Afghanistan, we have to continue to take the fight to al-Qaeda and its Taliban allies. Perhaps now they will take seriously the work that we are doing on trying to have some reconciliation process that resolves the insurgency," she said.
Responding to questions, Clinton said there's no doubt that al-Qaeda is somewhat decentralized, but that bin Laden remained the brains behind the operation and the inspiration.
"He was the person who people pledged loyalty to when they joined al-Qaeda. It wasn't to an organisation; it was to an individual," she said.
"So our message to the Taliban hasn't changed; it just has even greater resonance today. They can't wait us out, they can't defeat us; they need to come into the political process and denounce al-Qaeda and renounce violence and agree to abide by the laws and constitution of Afghanistan," Clinton said.
"We have a very close relationship with Pakistan, and it was crucial in finally leading us to bin Laden. So the work that was done over many years had many contributors, including our partners in Pakistan," Clinton said in her remarks on Monday, according to the transcripts provided by the State Department today."We're going to be working to bolster our partnerships even now, particularly as people are digesting this news. We're going to look for ways to put this into the context of the larger debate we're having here at home about what it takes to stay engaged in the world," she said.

Insecurity, social taboos: Schools shut as fear drives teachers away

A local school in Wana, the main settlement in South Waziristan tribal agency, has been closed for several months, and the children only come to play games in the compound.

“We have no teacher at the school,” Rida Ali, 8, said. “So we just play or do chores at home.” The teacher who taught them before insecurity shut down schools in the area lives only 1km or so away, but is unwilling to come to work. The children in Wana have not attended class since November.

“Due to security issues, teachers, especially female ones, are not going to class and this affects the education of girls,” Syed Fawad Ali Shah, emergency education officer for the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in Pakistan, told IRIN.

According to media reports, fear of the Taliban has meant many teachers have not gone back to work even in areas like Swat, which are now clear of militants.

“I love teaching, but I will never teach again. My husband says I must not do so as it is too dangerous,” Aima Malik, 25, said from the Khyber Agency where she had taught at a school for girls from 2006 to 2009. “Fewer and fewer women are ready to teach any longer,” she added.

“It is better that they be safe and learn how to cook or sew at home,” said Maryum Bibi, a mother of two teenage daughters living in a rural area on the outskirts of Peshawar. Her daughter, Jamila, 13, dreams of being a teacher but now says: “It seems I will never even complete my matriculation.”

Abdul Monib, a secondary school teacher in the Bajaur Agency, told IRIN: “As a teacher, I always feel sad when pupils drop out before completing their education. Now so many can no longer continue because their families need them to work. Others fear the classroom because of bombings in the past at schools and refuse to come any longer.”

Literacy rates down

The insecurity is affecting literacy rates. “Barely 1 per cent of women are literate in these areas,” Roohi Bano, regional manager for the Peshawar-based NGO Khwendo Kor, which works for the education of girls, told IRIN.

“It has always been difficult to find teachers in these parts. Few women are educated and families prefer them not to work. The situation that has now arisen following the reign of the Taliban will make matters even worse, with fewer and fewer women wishing to take up this work,” said Azra Khan, headmistress at a private school in Peshawar.

In some cases, she said, threats had been made even against teachers in big cities. “At least two of my teachers no longer wish to work here,” she added.

The problem is compounded by the reluctance of parents to allow men to teach girls. “My husband has insisted we withdraw our daughter from her school because there are some male teachers there. He has orthodox views and says this is unacceptable,” said Zakia Bibi, 40, from the town of Mingora in Swat.

Other factors have also affected education. “There are many families who have suffered financially, using up their savings during the displacement and unable to find jobs now, even when they have returned,” said Ahsan Ullah, 40, who runs a small shoe-making factory in the South Waziristan agency. He says he receives “dozens” of requests for jobs each week, but cannot accommodate more workers.

In the town of Mardan in Khyber Pakhtunkh’wa, Zainab Bibi, from the Orakzai Agency, wonders how to educate her four children. Her husband was part of the Taliban force in the area. “I fled on my own, with the children, in 2010, when fighting became fierce,” she said. “Some relatives helped us. I have not heard from my husband since then; my two older boys, aged 14 and 15, go out to work at an automobile workshop to bring in some kind of income – but I am desperate to see them back in school.”

Bibi is also concerned that unless they are educated, the boys may be tempted to join the Taliban. “A gun is a huge attraction for a young boy,” she said.—

Barack Obama to pay tribute to 9/11 victims

President Barack Obama on Thursday will follow up his triumph in the killing of Osama bin Laden by visiting New York's Ground Zero and meeting with families of people killed in the 9/11 attacks. The trip will be steeped in symbolism, with the president laying a wreath at the site of the September 11, 2001 massacre just days after he ordered the daring operation to kill bin Laden, the mastermind of the attacks.

Yet the White House stressed that this was not a victory tour, but a form of homage to the victims of the attacks that triggered Washington's controversial, global war against Al-Qaeda nearly a decade ago.

Calling the death of bin Laden a "cathartic moment for the American people," White House spokesman Jay Carney said Mr Obama wanted to "honour the spirit of unity in America that we all felt in the wake of that terrible attack."

His wreath will be laid in remembrance of the hundreds of firemen and others killed trying to rescue people from the collapsing Twin Towers.

"He will also meet with families of the victims and first responders in private," Carney said. "He wants to meet with them and share with them this important and significant moment, a bitter-sweet moment, I think, for many families of the victims."

The killing of America's nemesis in such spectacular fashion - during a helicopter-borne commando raid deep inside Pakistan - is undoubtedly one of Mr Obama's chief political triumphs since taking office in 2008.

Polls showed an immediate surge in support and even the usually squabbling Washington political establishment has rallied around the president.

But the White House appears serious about its declared intent to avoid triumphalism or the temptation to exploit the event for electoral gains.

Mr Obama notably invited his predecessor, George W. Bush, who was president at the time of 9/11 and earned widespread international opprobrium for his so-called "war on terror," to join him at Ground Zero.

Although the offer was declined, the White House had made its point.

"This is a moment of unity for Americans and a moment to recall the unity that existed in this country in the wake of the attacks on 9/11," Mr Carney said. "The invitation was made in that spirit."

There will be no public speech during the Ground Zero visit and the meeting with families will be private, although Carney did not exclude that some off-the-cuff comments might be made.

That reticence was portrayed as part of the same attempt to retain an atmosphere of dignity in the wake of bin Laden's killing.

Mr Obama has personally ordered that photographs of the al-Qaeda chief's dead body remain secret - despite clamor from some for visual proof of his demise.

"It is important for us to make sure that very graphic photos of somebody who was shot in the head are not floating around as an incitement to additional violence," Mr Obama told CBS news's 60 Minutes programme.

"As a propaganda tool. You know, that's not who we are. We don't trot out this stuff as trophies," he said.

"The fact of the matter is this was somebody who was deserving of the justice that he received. And I think Americans and people around the world are glad that he's gone. But we don't need to spike the football."

Pakistani Army, Shaken by Raid, Faces New Scrutiny

New York Times
The reputation of the army, the most powerful and privileged force in Pakistan, has been severely undermined by the American raid that killed Osama bin Laden, raising profound questions about its credibility from people at home and from benefactors abroad, including the United States.

That American helicopters could fly into Pakistan, carrying a team to kill the world’s most wanted terrorist and then fly out undetected has produced a stunned silence from the military and its intelligence service that some interpret as embarrassment, even humiliation.

There is no doubt that the raid has provoked a crisis of confidence for what was long seen as the one institution that held together a nation dangerously beset by militancy and chronically weak civilian governments.

The aftermath has left Pakistanis to challenge their leadership, and the United States to further question an already frequently distrusted partner.

By Wednesday, members of Parliament, newspaper editorials and Pakistan’s raucous political talk shows were calling for an explanation and challenging the military and intelligence establishment, institutions previously immune to public reproach.

Some were calling for an independent inquiry, focused less on the fact that the world’s most wanted terrorist was discovered in their midst than on whether the military could defend Pakistan’s borders and its nuclear arsenal from being snatched or attacked by the United States or India.

“If these people are found to be incompetent, heads should roll,” said Zafar Hilaly, a prominent newspaper columnist.

Different questions were coming from Pakistan’s neighbors and Western allies, including the United States. In Congress, powerful lawmakers in charge of foreign military assistance delivered scathing assessments of the Pakistani Army as either incompetent or duplicitous, saying that renewed financial support was hardly guaranteed.

In Britain, Prime Minister David Cameron told Parliament it was unbelievable that the Pakistani authorities did not know that Bin Laden was hiding not far from the capital.

But the most urgent question of all is what to do about it, and whether the United States should continue to invest in a Pakistani military whose assurances that it does not work with terrorists carry less weight than ever.

Pakistani officials, who feel betrayed by the United States for not informing them in advance about the raid, are responding more defensively by the day.

The biggest question for Pakistan is whether the event prompts a reconsideration of its security strategy, which has long depended on militant proxies, including groups entwined with Al Qaeda.

American officials are certain to use the fact that Bin Laden had taken shelter in Pakistan to press the country for a clearer break from its past. Both sides have an interest in preserving some form of the status quo. Pakistan would like to keep the billions of dollars in aid that flow from the United States. The United States would like to prevent this nuclear-armed Muslim nation from turning more hostile, hosting terrorist networks and complicating efforts to end the war in Afghanistan. But the challenges ahead were revealed in how the outrage over the Bin Laden raid has cut differently in Pakistan and the United States.

For the United States, it has raised the issue of whether any assurance provided by the Pakistani military can be trusted, including the security of its nuclear arsenal. The army has insisted it is adequately protected from extremists, but has resisted security assistance from the United States that it considers too invasive. “We can press Pakistan until the cows come home on its nuclear program,” said Michael Krepon, a co-founder of the Stimson Center in Washington, which works on programs to reduce nuclear weapons. “But they are not going to do the things that we would like them to do that they don’t want to do.”

In Pakistan, commentators who consider the nuclear weapons the country’s most valued asset have raised another concern: In light of the American operation, are the weapons safe from a raid by the United States, or even India?

Meanwhile, the chief of the army, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, and the head of the Inter-Services Intelligence agency, Lt. Gen. Ahmed Shuja Pasha, have remained silent about what they knew or did not know about Bin Laden’s presence.

They have both met with President Asif Ali Zardari since the American raid, but no mention has been made in public of those discussions. Civilian politicians have been virtually absent.

Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani left for France on Tuesday, but said Wednesday that he would cut short his trip and return home. Senior ministers in the cabinet failed to turn up in Parliament to offer any explanations on Tuesday or Wednesday.

Instead, the Foreign Office and the information minister, apparently on orders from the military, issued statements intended to explain the shortcomings.

In Parliament on Wednesday, Information Minister Firdous Ashiq Awan said the American helicopters had evaded detection by radar “due to hilly terrain” and use of “nap of the earth” flying techniques, an account that failed to comfort almost anyone.

The Foreign Office defended the fact that Bin Laden was not detected because the high security walls at his house in Abbottabad were in line with a culture of privacy. These scant explanations fueled more speculation.

One of the military’s biggest advocates, Kamran Khan, a journalist whose nightly television show garners big audiences, led the chorus: “We had the belief that our defense was impenetrable, but look what has happened. Such a massive intrusion and it went undetected.”

Mr. Khan posed the question on many Pakistani minds: “What is the guarantee that our strategic assets and security installations are safe?”

In some Pakistani quarters, the failure of the army and intelligence agencies to detect Bin Laden, or to do anything about him if indeed his presence was known, prompted calls for an overhaul of the nation’s strategic policies.

“Instead of making more India-specific nuclear-capable missiles, the funds and the energy should be directed to eliminating the terrorists,” said an editorial in the newspaper Pakistan Today.

The editor, Arif Nizami, said the American raid made a mockery of the Pakistani military’s bravura that its fighter jets could shoot down American drones. “You talk of taking out drones, and you can’t even take out helicopters,” Mr. Nizami said.

Some Pakistanis said they were more concerned about the fact that known terrorists were living in their midst than the violation of sovereignty by the Americans.

“The terrorists’ being on our soil is the biggest violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty,” said Athar Minallah, a prominent lawyer. “If Osama bin Laden lives in Abbottabad, there could be a terrorist in my neighborhood.”

Despite rapid growth, India lets its girls die

The room is large and airy, the stone floors clean and cool — a welcome respite from the afternoon sun. Until your eyes take in the horror that it holds. Ten severely malnourished children — nine of them girls.

The starving girls in this hospital ward include a 21-month-old with arms and legs the size of twigs and an emaciated 1-year-old with huge, vacant eyes. Without urgent medical care, most will not live to see their next birthday.

They point to a painful reality revealed in India's most recent census: Despite a booming economy and big cities full of luxury cars and glittering malls, the country is failing its girls.

Early results show India has 914 girls under age 6 for every 1,000 boys. A decade ago, many were horrified when the ratio was 927 to 1,000.

The discrimination happens through abortions of female fetuses and sheer neglect of young girls, despite years of high-profile campaigns to address the issue. So serious is the problem that it's illegal for medical personnel to reveal the gender of an unborn fetus, although evidence suggests the ban is widely circumvented.

"My mother-in-law says a boy is necessary," says Sanju, holding her severely malnourished 9-month-old daughter in her lap in the hospital. She doesn't admit to deliberately starving the girl but only shrugs her own thin shoulders when asked why her daughter is so sick.

She will try again for a son in a year or two, she says.

Part of the reason Indians favor sons is the enormous expense in marrying off girls. Families often go into debt arranging marriages and paying elaborate dowries. A boy, on the other hand, will one day bring home a bride and dowry. Hindu custom also dictates that only sons can light their parents' funeral pyres.

But it's not simply that girls are more expensive for impoverished families. The census data shows that the worst offenders are the relatively wealthy northern states of Punjab and Haryana.

In Morena, a sun-baked, largely rural district in the heart of India, the numbers are especially grim. This census showed that only 825 girls for every 1,000 boys in the district made it to their sixth birthdays, down from an already troubling 829 a decade ago.

Though abortion is allowed in India, the country banned revealing the gender of unborn fetuses in 1994 in an attempt to halt sex-selective abortions. Every few years, federal and state governments announce new incentives — from free meals to free education — to encourage people to take care of their girls.

In Morena, a Madhya Pradesh state government program offers poor families with one or two daughters a few thousand rupees (a few hundred dollars) for every few years of schooling, and more than 100,000 rupees ($2,250) when they graduate high school.

But while a handful of Indian women have attained some of the highest positions in politics and business — from late Prime Minister Indira Gandhi to Pepsi CEO Indra Nooyi — a deep-rooted cultural preference for sons remains.

Even the government has accepted that it has failed to save millions of little girls.

"Whatever measures that have been put in over the last 40 years have not had any impact," India's Home Secretary G.K. Pillai said last month when announcing the census numbers.

In Morena's homes, villages, schools and hospitals lie some of the answers to why the country keeps losing girls.

In the district hospital's maternity ward, a wrinkled old woman walks out holding a just-born girl wrapped in a dirty rag like an unwelcome present. Munni, who uses only one name, is clearly unhappy. Her daughter-in-law has just given birth to her sixth girl in 12 years of marriage.

Will the daughter-in-law go through another pregnancy?

"Everyone wants boys. A boy takes care of you in your old age," Munni says.

As a mother-in-law, Munni will likely have enormous control over her son's wife, influencing how many children she has and nudging or bullying her to bear a son.

The hospital insists it strictly obeys the law against using sonograms to reveal the gender of a fetus, says R.C. Bandil, who heads the facility. The sex ratio at birth at his hospital is as high as 940-945, he says. "Why is it 825 for the 0-6 group?" he asks.

Part of the answer lies in his own hospital's malnutrition ward.

"Women cry when they have girls," nurse Lalitha Gujar says as she spoons powdered coconut, peanuts and sesame seeds into bowls of fortified milk to nourish the tiny children.

All nine mothers of the sickly infant girls say they want sons — to look after them when they get old, because their sisters-in-law have more sons, because their mothers-in-law demand male children.

"If a woman has a boy, for a month she will be looked after. If she has a girl, she'll be back in the fields in three days," says Sudha Misra, a local social worker.

An exhausted mother who faces neglect, poor nutrition and blame for producing a daugher is likely to pass on that neglect, social workers say. For an infant, that can mean the difference between life and death.

"A malnourished child will get sick and the chances of death are very high," Bandil says.

Males get first priority. "First the husband is seated and fed, then the brothers and then whatever is left is fed to the girls," says Bandil. "If there are two mangoes in the house, first the boy will get to eat."

For the very poor, the pressures to bear sons result in mistreatment of both the baby girl and mother. And rich women are not immune to this mistreatment if they fail to bear male children.

For those with money, it's often about being able to locate a radiologist who, for a cost, will break the law and reveal the sex of the fetus, or being able to fly abroad for such tests.

A 2007 study by the rights group ActionAid India found that gender ratios were worse in urban areas, and that sex-selective abortions were more common among wealthier and higher-caste people who could afford ways to learn the gender of fetuses.

The law is not enough to combat "a society that values boys over girls," says Ravinder Kaur, a professor of sociology at New Delhi's Indian Institute of Technology.

"Laws are good because they may act as a deterrent" she says, but sex-selective abortions continue underground because "people find more devious ways."

Afghanistan says Pakistan should have known bin Laden was there

Pakistan's spy agency should have known Osama bin Laden was hiding not far from its capital, Afghanistan's Defense Ministry said on Wednesday, the first direct comment from Kabul about its neighbor's apparent inability to track the al Qaeda leader.

Defence Ministry spokesman Zaher Azimy said the case also raised questions about Pakistan's ability to adequately protect its nuclear weapons.

Bin Laden, architect of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, was killed by a U.S. strike team in a military garrison town about 60 km (35 miles) north of Islamabad on Monday.

U.S. lawmakers have demanded a review of aid to Pakistan after the disclosure that bin Laden could have been living in the house, which is not far from Pakistan's main military academy, for five or six years.

"When we talk about the location of the house and a military academy nearby ... at the very least it should be known about the activities inside the house and who is living there," Azimy told a news conference.

"If Pakistan's spy agency was not aware of the house near the academy, it brings the agency under question. If I was a security analyst, I would raise these very important questions."

Pakistan's powerful Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) spy agency and the army have been conspicuously silent about the raid, which has raised questions about whether they knew all along where bin Laden has been hiding.

The ISI has also been accused of maintaining ties with fighters targeting U.S. troops across the border in Afghanistan. Kabul and Islamabad have long had a difficult relationship.

Azimy said the killing of bin Laden also raised broader questions about the ISI and the Pakistan military, including its ability to safeguard its nuclear arsenal.

"If the agency was not aware that the biggest terrorist had been living there for six long years, how can it protect its strategic weapons?" he said.

"How can the world be assured that the strategic and atomic weapons would not be in danger in the future?"

Afghan President Hamid Karzai was far less direct in his first comments about bin Laden's killing on Monday, saying that it proved the global fight against Islamist militants was "not in Afghan villages."

U.S. presses Pakistan for information on Osama bin Laden compound

Obama administration officials here and in Islamabad demanded Tuesday that Pakistan quickly provide answers to specific questions about Osama bin Laden and his years-long residence in a bustling Pakistani city surrounded by military installations.

In addition to detailed information about the bin Laden compound — who owned and built the structure and its security system — Pakistani officials were asked in meetings with U.S. military, intelligence and diplomatic interlocutors to provide names of witnesses who can testify about visitors to the compound. U.S. lawmakers have said it defied logic that bin Laden was able to hide in plain sight without some level of official Pakistani knowledge or complicity. Some have suggested that $3 billion in annual U.S. military and economic assistance be reconsidered, while others joined with House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio), who said Tuesday that “this is no time to back away from Pakistan.”

How Pakistan responds will determine the future of the long-brittle relationship between the two countries, as well as the endgame in the Afghanistan war, according to U.S. and Pakistani officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to talk candidly about what they called a pivotal moment.

The stakes could not be higher. A final breach could put at risk administration hopes of continuing military progress against Afghan Taliban insurgents and bringing reconcilable insurgent leaders, lodged in Pakistani sanctuaries, to the negotiating table this year. It could make the CIA’s drone missile strikes against insurgent targets in Pakistan, conducted with tacit Pakistani cooperation and some intelligence assistance, much more difficult.

But the moment of crisis was also seen by some administration officials as an unprecedented opportunity to solidify the relationship, assuming wholehearted Pakistani cooperation. “At this point, it’s very important that Pakistan demonstrate its commitment to work with America in the war on terror,” one U.S. official said. After weeks of tight focus on the operation itself, the White House will hold high-level national security meetings this week on how to leverage the post-raid situation to gain more, rather than less, cooperation.

Two days after helicopter-borne U.S. Navy SEALs took bin Laden’s life in a surprise raid, Pakistan seems unsure how to position itself. Reeling from domestic criticism over an American operation on its soil and international suspicion that it is harboring terrorists, the Islamabad government expressed “deep concern” Tuesday over what it called an “unauthorized unilateral action,” but also took credit for helping to locate the terrorist leader.

A Foreign Ministry statement said Pakistan’s spy agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence directorate (ISI), had kept the compound “under sharp focus” since construction got underway in 2003. But one intelligence official said that although it was searched in pursuit of an al-Qaeda operative that year, nothing was found and it was never scrutinized again.

U.S. spies dig into data from bin Laden raid

U.S. intelligence officers are digging through a cache of computer equipment and data taken in the raid that killed Osama bin Laden in hopes it will yield leads on other al Qaeda leaders and plots, according to American officials.

White House counterterrorism adviser John Brennan said the U.S. commandos who stormed the northern Pakistan compound where bin Laden had been holed up took "whatever material we thought was appropriate and what was needed."

"We are trying to determine exactly the worth of whatever information we might have been able to pick up," Brennan said Monday. He would disclose no details, but added, "This is a very important time to continue to prosecute this effort against al Qaeda."

A U.S. counterterrorism official, also speaking on condition of anonymity, said the haul inclued electronics and storage media such as CDs and DVDs. That official said the cache was larger than expected, since bin Laden was communicating by courier and his compound had no phone or internet service.Investigators will be looking first for any sign of attacks being planned, then for anything that leads them to other top operatives of the terrorist network, the counterterrorism official said. A task force was being set up at the CIA to comb through the evidence seized in the raid, according to a senior intelligence official who briefed reporters on condition of anonymity.

Bin Laden was the mastermind of al Qaeda's September 11, 2001, attacks on New York and Washington, which killed nearly 3,000 people and triggered a war in Afghanistan that U.S. and allied troops are still fighting. But the terrorist network dispersed after the U.S. invasion that followed the 9/11 attacks, while others inspired by the group have taken up the cause with little or no direct connection to the group.

Former CIA Director Michael Hayden told CNN's "The Situation Room" that the "diffuse" nature of al Qaeda is among its strengths.

"Keep in mind this is a network, not a hierarchy," Hayden said. "So you've got still very active, very talented cells around the world."

Osama...THE MONSTER'S Death: What This Means for Pakistan's ISI

When U.S. President Obama called Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari to tell him the news that Osama bin Laden had been killed by U.S. citizens in a lightening raid not far from the Pakistani capital last night, he also instructed his team to similarly inform their Pakistani counterparts. The question is, who was surprised when they picked up the phone?

That bin Laden had been living in a specially constructed compound less than an hours' drive from Pakistani military HQ, and in the same town as the country's premier military academy, makes the near constant denials by Pakistan's intelligence agencies that the terror group leader was in the country difficult to swallow. Sure, there are at times a Keystone-cops element to the operational methods of the agencies - those assigned to trail foreign journalists in the country are less than subtle in their surveillance methods: One once asked me my address, as he was sitting in my house, another decided that quizzing my driver about my activities was far less work than actually following me to interviews - but bumbling or not, they are ubiquitous. The crackle and click of telephone lines is the constant reminder that no conversation over the phone is private, the crew-cut men in beige that materialize whenever I start asking questions proof that one is never quite alone in Pakistan. So the idea that absolutely no one but American intelligence knew who was living in that multi-million dollar compound beggars belief.bama was careful to thank Pakistani assistance in the raid, but how, exactly, the Pakistanis assisted will be a key part of understanding the relationship between Pakistan and the U.S. going forward. Just a few weeks ago, U.S. Chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Michael Mullen told Pakistani English-language newspaper Dawn that the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) had a "relationship" with the al Qaeda affiliated Haqqani network:

"It's fairly well known that the ISI has a longstanding relationship with the Haqqani network….Haqqani is supporting, funding, training fighters that are killing Americans and killing coalition partners. And I have a sacred obligation to do all I can to make sure that doesn't happen…..So that's at the core - it's not the only thing - but that's at the core that I think is the most difficult part of the relationship."The Haqqani network is thought to be behind several gruesome attacks on foreign soldiers and embassies in neighboring Afghanistan, including the 2009 attack on the Indian Embassy there that killed 17 and wounded 63. More worryingly is recent evidence that the ISI may have had links to Lashkar-e-Taiba, the group behind the 2008 terror attacks on Mumbai, in which 10 well-trained Pakistani militants coordinated a bombing and shooting attack at several landmarks that killed 164. At a trial slated for May 16th David Headley, the Pakistani American accused of assisting LeT in reconnaissance for the attack, is expected to implicate the ISI, confirming long held suspicions by both American and Indian authorities, as well as many Pakistanis.

Defenders of the ISI say that it is their job to maintain contacts with groups like that as part of their intelligence gathering methods. One spokesman told me that the ISI has infiltrators in the terror groups just like the FBI has people undercover in the Mafia. That may be the case. But either way the ISI isn't going to come out of this well. Either they knew about bin Laden and waited to inform the U.S., or they were oblivious to the presence of a massive, multi-million dollar compound in their back yard, one so secretive that the residents burned their own trash. That doesn't augur well for Pakistan's ability to tackle the next terrorist threat that comes out of the woodwork.

OSAMA....THE MONSTER IS DEAD!!!!!! U.S. troops kill Osama bin Laden in Pakistan

NEW YORK TIMES
Osama bin Laden, the mastermind of the most devastating attack on American soil in modern times and the most hunted man in the world, was killed in a firefight with United States forces in Pakistan on Sunday, President Obama announced.In a dramatic late-night appearance in the East Room of the White House, Mr. Obama declared that “justice has been done” as he disclosed that American military and C.I.A. operatives had finally cornered Bin Laden, the Al Qaeda leader who had eluded them for nearly a decade. American officials said Bin Laden resisted and was shot in the head. He was later buried at sea.

The news touched off an extraordinary outpouring of emotion as crowds gathered outside the White House, in Times Square and at the ground zero site, waving American flags, cheering, shouting, laughing and chanting, “U.S.A., U.S.A.!” In New York City, crowds sang “The Star-Spangled Banner.” Throughout downtown Washington, drivers honked horns deep into the night.

“For over two decades, Bin Laden has been Al Qaeda’s leader and symbol,” the president said in a statement televised around the world. “The death of Bin Laden marks the most significant achievement to date in our nation’s effort to defeat Al Qaeda. But his death does not mark the end of our effort. There’s no doubt that Al Qaeda will continue to pursue attacks against us. We must and we will remain vigilant at home and abroad.”

Bin Laden’s demise is a defining moment in the American-led fight against terrorism, a symbolic stroke affirming the relentlessness of the pursuit of those who attacked New York and Washington on Sept. 11, 2001. What remains to be seen, however, is whether it galvanizes Bin Laden’s followers by turning him into a martyr or serves as a turning of the page in the war in Afghanistan and gives further impetus to Mr. Obama to bring American troops home.

How much his death will affect Al Qaeda itself remains unclear. For years, as they failed to find him, American leaders have said that he was more symbolically important than operationally significant because he was on the run and hindered in any meaningful leadership role. Yet he remained the most potent face of terrorism around the world, and some of those who played down his role in recent years nonetheless celebrated his death.

Given Bin Laden’s status among radicals, the American government braced for possible retaliation. A senior Pentagon official said late Sunday that military bases in the United States and around the world were ordered to a higher state of readiness. The State Department issued a worldwide travel warning, urging Americans in volatile areas “to limit their travel outside of their homes and hotels and avoid mass gatherings and demonstrations.”

The strike could exacerbate deep tensions with Pakistan, which has periodically bristled at American counterterrorism efforts even as Bin Laden evidently found safe refuge on its territory for nearly a decade. Since taking office, Mr. Obama has ordered significantly more drone strikes on suspected terrorist targets in Pakistan, stirring public anger there and prompting the Pakistani government to protest.

When the end came for Bin Laden, he was found not in the remote tribal areas along the Pakistani-Afghan border where he has long been presumed to be sheltered, but in a massive compound about an hour’s drive north from the Pakistani capital of Islamabad. He was hiding in the medium-sized city of Abbottabad, home to a large Pakistani military base and a military academy of the Pakistani Army.

The compound, only about a third of a mile from the academy, is at the end of a narrow dirt road and is roughly eight times larger than other homes in the area, but had no telephone or Internet connections. When American operatives converged on the house on Sunday, Bin Laden “resisted the assault force” and was killed in the middle of an intense gun battle, a senior administration official said, but details were still sketchy early Monday morning.

The official said that military and intelligence officials first learned last summer that a “high-value target” was being protected in the compound and began working on a plan for going in to get him. Beginning in March, Mr. Obama presided over five national security meetings at the White House to go over plans for the operation and on Friday morning, just before leaving Washington to tour tornado damage in Alabama, gave the final order for Navy Seals and C.I.A. operatives to strike.

Mr. Obama called it a “targeted operation,” although officials said one helicopter was lost because of a mechanical failure and had to be destroyed to keep it from falling into hostile hands.

In addition to Bin Laden, three men were killed during the 40-minute raid, one believed to be his son and the other two his couriers, according to an American official who briefed reporters under White House ground rules forbidding further identification. A woman was killed when she was used as a shield by a male combatant, the official said, and two others wounded.

“No Americans were harmed,” Mr. Obama said. “They took care to avoid civilian casualties. After a firefight, they killed Osama bin Laden and took custody of his body.” Muslim tradition requires burial within 24 hours, but by doing it at sea, American authorities presumably were trying to avoid creating a shrine for his followers.

The fate of Ayman al-Zawahiri, Al Qaeda’s second-in-command, was unclear.Bin Laden’s death came nearly 10 years after Qaeda terrorists hijacked four American passenger jets, crashing three of them into the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon outside Washington. The fourth hijacked jet, United Flight 93, crashed into the Pennsylvania countryside after passengers fought the militants.This is important news for us, and for the world,” said Gordon Felt, president of the group, Families of Flight 93. “It cannot ease our pain, or bring back our loved ones. It does bring a measure of comfort that the mastermind of the September 11th tragedy and the face of global terror can no longer spread his evil.”

The mostly young people who celebrated in the streets of New York and Washington saw it as a historic moment, one that for many of them culminated a worldwide manhunt that started when they were children.

Some climbed trees and lampposts directly in front of the White House to cheer and wave flags. Cigars and noisemakers were common. One group started singing, “Osama, Osama, hey, hey, hey, goodbye.”

Maureen Hasson, 22, a recent college graduate working for the Justice Department, came down to Lafayette Square in a fuchsia party dress and flip-flops. “This is full circle for our generation,” she said. “Just look around at the average age here. We were all in middle school when the terrorists struck. We all vividly remember 9/11 and this is the close of that chapter.”

Sam Sherman, 18, a freshman at George Washington University originally from New York, also rushed down to the White House. “The feeling you can’t even imagine, the feeling in the air. It’s crazy,” he said. “I have friends with parents dead because of Osama bin Laden’s plan, O.K. So when I heard this news, I was coming down to celebrate.”

Mr. Obama said Pakistan had helped develop the intelligence that led to Bin Laden, but an American official said the Pakistani government was not informed about the strike in advance. “We shared our intelligence on this compound with no other country, including Pakistan,” the official said.

Mr. Obama recalled his statements in the 2008 presidential campaign when he vowed to order American forces to strike inside Pakistan if necessary even without Islamabad’s permission. “That is what we’ve done,” he said. “But it’s important to note that our counterterrorism cooperation with Pakistan helped lead us to Bin Laden and the compound where he was hiding.”

Relations with Pakistan had fallen in recent weeks to their lowest point in years. Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, publicly criticized the Pakistani military two weeks ago for failing to act against extremists allied to Al Qaeda who shelter in the tribal areas of North Waziristan. Last week, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, head of the Pakistani Army, said Pakistan had broken the back of terrorism on its territory, prompting skepticism in Washington.

Mr. Obama called President Asif Ali Zardari of Pakistan to tell him about the strike after it was set in motion, and his advisers called their Pakistani counterparts. “They agree that this is a good and historic day for both of our nations,” Mr. Obama said.

The city of Abbottabad where Bin Laden was found has had other known Al Qaeda presence in the past. A senior Indonesian militant, Umar Patek, was arrested there earlier this year. Mr. Patek was protected by a Qaeda operative, a clerk who worked undercover at the main post office, a signal that Al Qaeda may have had other operations in the area.

The Pakistani military cordoned off the roads and alleys leading to the compound Monday. But residents of the middle-class area who were reached by phone said they had not been suspicious about the residents of the house, despite its size and the fact that very few people ever seemed to leave the compound.

As the operation’s start approached, many American officials at the United States consulate in Peshawar, the capital of the northwest area of Pakistan, were told suddenly to depart last Friday, leaving behind only a core group of essential staff. The American officials said they had been told to leave because of fears of kidnapping but were not tipped off to the operation.Analysts said Bin Laden’s death amounted to a double blow for Al Qaeda, after its sermons of anti-Western violence seemed to be rendered irrelevant by the wave of political upheaval rolling through the Arab world.It comes at a time when Al Qaeda’s narrative is already very much in doubt in the Arab world,” said Martin S. Indyk, vice president and director of foreign policy at the Brookings Institution. “Its narrative was that violence was the way to redeem Arab honor and dignity. But Osama bin Laden and his violence didn’t succeed in unseating anybody.”

Al Qaeda sympathizers reacted with disbelief, anger and in some cases talk of retribution. On a Web site considered an outlet for Al Qaeda messages, forum administrators deleted posts by users announcing Bin Laden’s death and demanded that members wait until the news was confirmed by Al Qaeda sources, according to the SITE Intelligence Group, an organization that monitors radicals.

Even so, SITE said, sympathizers on the forum posted messages calling Bin Laden a martyr and suggesting retaliation. “America will reap the same if the news is true and false,” said one message. “The lions will remain lions and will continue moving in the footsteps of Usama,” said another, using an alternate spelling of Bin Laden’s name.

In the United States, the Council on American-Islamic Relations, an advocacy organization, said it welcomed Bin Laden’s death. “As we have stated repeatedly since the 9/11 terror attacks, Bin Laden never represented Muslims or Islam,” the group said in a statement. “In fact, in addition to the killing of thousands of Americans, he and Al Qaeda caused the deaths of countless Muslims worldwide.”

Mr. Obama called to inform his predecessor, George W. Bush, who launched the war against Al Qaeda after Sept. 11, yet was frustrated in his efforts to capture Bin Laden “dead or alive,” as he once put it. Mr. Bush released a statement saying, “this momentous achievement marks a victory for America, for people who seek peace around the world, and for all those who lost loved ones on September 11, 2001.”

“The fight against terror goes on, but tonight America has sent an unmistakable message: No matter how long it takes, justice will be done,” he added.

Mr. Obama used similar language and warned that the war against terrorists had not ended. “We will be relentless in defense of our citizens and our friends and allies,” he said. “We will be true to the values that make us who we are. And on nights like this one, we can say to those families who have lost loved ones to Al Qaeda’s terror, justice has been done.”

The president was careful to add that, as Mr. Bush did during his presidency, the United States is not at war with Islam. “Bin Laden was not a Muslim leader; he was a mass murderer of Muslims,” Mr. Obama said. “Indeed, Al Qaeda has slaughtered scores of Muslims in many countries, including our own. So his demise should be welcomed by all who believe in peace and human dignity.”

Obama is an American. Let’s move on.

Editorial:The Washington Post
IT SAYS SOMETHING embarrassing — actually, make that disturbing — about the state of American politics that the president of the United States took to the White House briefing room Wednesday to prove that he had, in fact, been born in the United States. The White House’s move to unseal, and release, Barack Obama’s birth certificate came after polls indicated a growing number of Americans doubting that basic fact. A USA Today/Gallup Poll released Monday showed that just 38 percent believe that Mr. Obama was “definitely” born in the United States, with 18 percent saying he “probably” was.

As the long-form birth certificate disgorged by Hawaii authorities and released by the White House demonstrates once and for all, this is complete nonsense. The “birther” delusion would be laughable if it were not so widespread and if it did not carry with it the unmistakable whiff of racism. We doubt that the questions about Mr. Obama’s birthplace would have taken off if his father had been from Canada rather than Kenya.

At the same time, there was a certain amount of play-acting in Mr. Obama’s assertions of injury. If anything, the decision by developer and potential Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump to seize on the “birther” issue played into Democrats’ hands: It allowed Mr. Obama to position himself as the sane grown-up to Mr. Trump’s “carnival barker.”

The president asserted Wednesday that he would not normally dignify these claims with a response but that the birther debate was drowning out the more important discussion about the budget. “The dominant news story wasn’t about these huge, monumental choices that we’re going to have to make,” the president said. “It was about my birth certificate. And that was true on most of the news outlets that were represented here.”

Not by our count. On broadcast and cable networks, far more stories overall have mentioned the proposal by House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) than the birther debate in the past several weeks. The New York Times ran nine articles and columns touching on the “birther” controversy, mostly to debunk or ridicule it. The Post had about a dozen doing much the same. By contrast, Mr. Ryan’s budget plan drew 64 mentions in the Times and 96 in The Post since April 4, the day it was released.

Nonetheless, Mr. Obama is correct that the country has more important matters to discuss than the presidential birth certificate. Mr. Trump was busy crowing Wednesday that he had done the country a service by prodding the president to release the document. Now Mr. Trump appears to be ready to pivot to the equally bogus issue of the president’s grades in college and law school. Our advice to Mr. Trump: Cease and desist. As Mr. Obama said Wednesday, “We do not have time for this kind of silliness.”

Obama shows original birth certificate

President Obama releases his long-form birth certificate, saying the controversy over his birth has became a "sideshow" to real problems facing the nation.

BIRTHER CLAIMS LACK MERIT...Obama was born in Hawaii on August 4, 1961. Period.

cnn.com
It remains red meat for some critics of President Obama. But a CNN investigation reveals what most analysts have said since the "birther" controversy erupted in 2008: Obama was born in Hawaii.
Was Barack Obama really born in America?

A new CNN investigation reveals what most analysts have been saying since the "birther" controversy erupted during the 2008 presidential campaign: Obama was born in Hawaii on August 4, 1961. Period.

Is Parachinar not part of Pakistan

Over 100 residents of militant-besieged Parachinar, which is the headquarters of Kurram Agency, have set up a protest camp outside the National Press Club to press the government for ridding them of the armed gangs of Taliban.

Through a memorandum, a copy of which is available with The News, the Youth of Parachinar, a platform of Turi and Bangash tribes, aired some questions: Is Parachinar not a part of Pakistan? Is it really impossible for the government to open and make secure the main Thal Parachinar-Peshawar Road that was closed over four years back?

It continued could a civilised nation justify the crippling embargo on a population of more than 0.5 million people? Is there any humanitarian organisation in Pakistan that could help alleviate deepening sufferings of these people, facing acute shortage of life-saving drugs and other medicines: paucity of daily use items such as rice, atta, tea, sugar and groceries?

“I have met the President at least 20 times and Prime Minister 40 times on different occasions and raised the issue with them but it appears either they are insensitive to our agony or unable to do anything to drive the militants out of Parachinar,” said an MNA from the Kurram Agency’s headquarters Sajid Hussain Turi while talking to The News at the camp.

Turi, who is chairman of the National Assembly’s standing committee on States and Frontier Regions, pointed out as the government functionaries were unable to perform their responsibility in Parachinar there was a breakdown of civil and social services: education and health were the most affected sectors; donors and foreign philanthropists had also stopped visiting the area due to seething insecurity.

Obama reviews cooperation from Pakistan

President Barack Obama on Tuesday reviewed the co-operation being received by Pakistan in the war against terrorism with his national security team.

The review of Pakistan’s co-operation came on a day when several media published secret U.S. cables, allegedly stolen by WikiLeaks, which questioned the level of cooperation from Pakistan authorities in the war against terrorism by the U.S. authorities.

“The President received an update on our efforts to ensure effective cooperation with Pakistan against al-Qaeda and other violent extremists,” White House said in a statement after Mr. Obama chaired his situation room monthly meeting on Afghanistan and Pakistan with his national security team.

“The President received a briefing on the security situation in Afghanistan, including our efforts to sustain momentum against Taliban, transition to an Afghan security lead, continued support for the increased capability of Afghan National Security Forces and our efforts to support reintegration and Afghan-led reconciliation,” White House said

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters that the meeting was not a decisional one.

“This is not a decisional meeting. This is one of the regular monthly meetings, run by the President on Afghanistan and Pakistan with the usual principals involved in that meeting, but it is not decisional,” he said in response to a question.

Chaired by President Obama, the Af-Pak situation room meeting was attended by Vice President Joe Biden, (via teleconference); Secretary of Defence, Robert Gates; Attorney General, Eric Holder; US Ambassador to the UN, Susan Rice; National Security Advisor, Tom Donilon; Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper and Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism, John O Brennan.

Also Special Representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Marc Grossman; Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, Michele Flournoy; Director of Central Intelligence Agency, Leon Panetta; Administrator of Agency for International Development, Rajiv Shah; Chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Michael Mullen were present in the meeting.

While U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan, Karl Eikenberry; U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan, Carl Munter and General David Petraeus, Commander of ISAF joined the meeting via videoconference.