Islamabad - Osama bin Laden lived outside Pakistan's mountainous tribal region following 9/11 terrorist attacks in USA longer than previously believed, a media report said on Saturday.
Dawn newspaper cited investigators saying that during questioning with bin Laden's 29-year Yemeni wife, Amal al-Sadah, it was revealed that he left lawless tribal areas along Afghan border in 2003 and moved to a small village Chak Shah Mohammad in Haripur district.
Haripur is located about 40 kilometres south-east of Abbottabad, a city of around 1 million population where US special forces killed the al-Qaeda chief in a raid on Monday early morning.
Amal, one of three bin Laden widows in Pakistani custody, told the investigators that after living for two and half years in Chak Shah Mohammad, the family moved to Abbottabad, where a new house was built for them.
For years Pakistani and US officials had believed that since his escape from Tora Bora mountains in 2001, bin Laden was hiding somewhere in rugged terrain along Afghan border, maybe in a cave.
“Imagine, this guy was living in our midst in Haripur and Abbottabad for seven and a half years and we all, both Pakistanis and Americans, had been looking for him in the wrong direction,” the Dawn report cited an official as saying.
Amal, who reportedly married to bin Laden two years before 9/11
attacks as his fifth wife when the chief terrorist was 43, also provided some further details of the US operation to Pakistani law enforcement agencies.
She said that she had just moved with her husband to the bedroom and switched off the lights when they heard gunshots. Before bin Laden could reach out for his Kalashnikov, the Navy SEALS team burst in and shot her husband.
Amal was also wounded by a bullet in her leg and later taken into custody together with two other Saudi wives, four children of bin Laden's daughter who was killed in a drone strike in Pakistan's tribal area, his five-year old son and 22-year-old daughter.
Among those apprehended were also the children of Bin Laden's son who was killed during the operation. He was married to the sister of two Pakistani aides of the al-Qaeda chief. They were identified only by first names Arshad and Tariq.
The only woman killed during the operation is believed to be bin Laden's daughter-in-law.
There have been conflicting reports about the identity of bin Laden's son killed during the assault. John Brennan, the chief counterterrorism advisor to US President Barack Obama claimed on Monday that Hamza Bin Laden, the eldest son, died in the action.
But a report in Pakistan's daily The News cited local intelligence officials saying that another son, Khalid bin Laden, was killed. - Sapa-dpa