Iran, May 05: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has denied reports that Osama bin Laden is in Tehran and insisted that the al-Qaeda leader is, in fact, in Washington DC.
“Rest assured that he’s in Washington. I think there’s a high chance he’s there,” he said.
Without backing up the claim, Mr Ahmadinejad said he had “heard” that Bin Laden was in the US capital.
“Yes, I did. He’s there. Because he was a previous partner of Mr Bush,” he said referring to former president George W Bush.
“They were colleagues, in fact, in the old days. You know that. They were in the oil business together. They worked together. Mr Bin Laden never cooperated with Iran but he cooperated with Mr Bush.”
US officials ought to know the whereabouts of extremist Islamic leaders, he said.
“The US Government has invaded Afghanistan in order to arrest Bin Laden. They probably know where Bin Laden is. If they don’t know he is, why did they invade? Could we know the intelligence?
“First they should have tried to find his location, then invade, those who did not know about his location first they invaded and then they tried to find out where he is, is that logical?”
—Agencies