World

Bin Laden On The Loose

By CBSNews.com staff CBSNews.com staff

February 12, 1999 / 12:57 PM EST / CBS

Islamic militant Osama bin Laden was reported on Monday to be hiding in Afghanistan after being snubbed by the Taliban's supreme leader and protector.

Afghan sources and Arabic newspapers said America's public enemy number one was somewhere in Afghanistan, although the Taliban movement insisted it had no idea where he was.

The reports suggested a cooling of the relationship between Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar and his "guest," bin Laden, after fresh pressure and veiled threats of further U.S. attacks to force the Saudi dissident to leave the country.

Abdel-Bari Atwan, editor of the London-based al-Quds al-Arabi newspaper, said bin Laden, a hero to Muslim radicals from Iraq to the hills of Kashmir, felt snubbed by the leader of the Taliban militia last month.

"Recently we received a call from somebody around him, that the Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar snubbed bin Laden when he went to congratulate him" during the three-day Eid al-Fitr holiday which started on Jan. 18, after the month of Ramadan, said Atwan.

"Bin Laden was left to wait for about two hours outside, and when they met, he (Omar) was very cold," Atwan said. "So bin Laden understood that he is not wanted any more in Afghanistan and he decided to find other places," he said.

Last week, Washington said it reserved the right to use military force again in pursuit of the man indicted for the bombings of U.S. embassies in East Africa last August, but Omar denied Sunday that he had caved in to American pressure.

"We can say that Afghans do not bow to anybody's force and (will) not, through pressure, accept their demands," Omar told a rare news conference as speculation put bin Laden anywhere from Iraq to Somalia.

The Taliban had clamped down on bin Laden before his disappearance, including taking his satellite telephone and wireless, screening his visitors and putting a special team of guards around him.

The London-based al-Hayat daily quoted witnesses in the Taliban's southern capital, Kandahar, as saying bin Laden left the city several days ago guarded by militiamen but was thought to be still in Afghanistan.

Afghan sources said his retinue included 10 Taliban guards and five of his own supporters. The location of his four wives, children and staff was unclear.

The United States and Britain, which have both put pressure on the Taliban over their "guest," reacted with mild disbelief to a weekend statement by the Islamic militia that bin Laden had mysteriously vanished.

The U.S. launched cruise missile attacks against suspected bin Laden training camps in southern Afghanistan last August after the embassy bombings, in which 250 people died.

CBS News Correspondent Randall Pinkston reports that the U.S. continues to offer up to $5 million for information leading to bin Laden's capture and arrest