ISLAMABAD – Pakistan's prime minister defended his nation's military and
intelligence services on Monday and said Pakistan was not solely to blame for
the failure to detect Osama bin Laden's presence in a garrison town close to the
capital.
Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, in his first address to parliament since
the covert U.S. raid that killed the al-Qaida chief a week ago, lashed out at
allegations Pakistan knew where bin Laden was hiding, though he offered no
details on what the country did know about his location. He also warned the U.S.
that any unilateral raids in the future would be met with "full force."
"It is disingenuous for anyone to blame Pakistan or state institutions of
Pakistan, including the ISI and the armed forces, for being in cahoots with
al-Qaida," Gilani said. "Elimination of Osama bin Laden, who launched waves
after waves of terrorists attacks against innocent Pakistanis, is indeed justice
done."
New signs were emerging of Pakistan's anger over the unilateral action taken
by the U.S. in sending Navy SEALs into the country from Afghanistan in
helicopters with radar-evading technology. In apparent retaliation, Pakistani
media have reported what they said was the name of the CIA station chief in
Islamabad in a possible leak from authorities seeking to damage covert American
activity in the country.
In his remarks to lawmakers, Gilani acknowledged his nation's failure to
track bin Laden but said the failure wasn't Pakistan's alone.
"Yes, there has been an intelligence failure," Gilani said. "It is not only
ours but of all the intelligence agencies of the world."
U.S. officials have said they see no evidence that anyone in the upper
echelons of Pakistan's military and intelligence establishment was complicit in
hiding bin Laden. But they still have serious questions about how the al-Qaida
chief was able to hole up for up to six years in the army town of Abbottabad,
just 35 miles (55 kilometers) from the capital, Islamabad.
President Barack Obama said the U.S. believes bin Laden must have had a
support network inside Pakistan.
"But we don't know who or what that support network was," Obama said in an
interview broadcast Sunday on CBS' "60 Minutes." "We don't know whether there
might have been some people inside of government, people outside of government,
and that's something that we have to investigate, and more importantly, the
Pakistani government has to investigate."
American officials have said they didn't
inform Pakistan in advance of the raid out of fear bin Laden could be tipped
off. AP
