Excerpt
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.
"Pakistani Military Investigates How Bin Laden Was Able to Hide in Plain View" by CARLOTTA GALL, New York Times 5/4/2011
Excerpt
The Pakistani military has taken charge of investigations into the circumstances that allowed Osama bin Laden to reside quietly in a three-story house on the edge of this town, officials here said. Military intelligence investigators returned to the house on Wednesday and spent most of the day working inside the compound, while the army and the police barred journalists and others from approaching the area.
The intelligence agencies have detained at least 11 people for questioning, including an immediate neighbor who once worked with the family and the construction manager who built the house, Pakistani news organizations reported.
They have also taken into custody the bodies of four people killed when an American Navy SEAL team made an air assault on the house early Monday.
Three women and nine children found in the house after the raid are also in the custody of the intelligence services, Pakistani security officials said. At least two are related to Bin Laden, one security official said: a 12- or 13-year-old daughter and his wife, who was shot in the leg but has received hospital care and is out of danger. He spoke on the condition of anonymity in accordance with the rules of his agency.
The national daily newspaper The News published a photograph that it said was the photo page of the passport of Bin Laden’s wife. The passport was from the Republic of Yemen and pictured a woman in a black head scarf named Amal Ahmed Abdulfattah, born March 29, 1987, making her 24 years old, about 30 years younger than Bin Laden.
Asked about the validity of the passport, the security official said he could not confirm whether it was connected to anyone detained after the raid.
Officials are still investigating the identity of the four people whose bodies were found inside the compound after the SEAL team departed with Bin Laden’s body. The bodies included two brothers and a son of Bin Laden, the security official said. American officials have said the fourth person killed was a woman, while the Pakistani official said the fourth was an unknown man.
The two brothers were known as Arshad Khan, the owner of the house, and Tareq Khan. Neighbors say they were either brothers or cousins. Preliminary investigations have made officials suspect that these were not their real names and that they were living under fake identities.
Arshad Khan was carrying an old, noncomputerized Pakistani national identity card, which said he was from Khat Kuruna, a village in Tangi district, near Charsadda in northwestern Pakistan. Yet officials have found that there is no record of an Arshad Khan in Khat Kuruna.
Slight correction of term "Seals team" to "SEAL team" mine (acronym for "United States Navy SEa, Air and Land" link opens in new page)
PBS Newshour 5/5/2011
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