Osama bin Laden, the Saudi dissident believed to have masterminded terror attacks in the United States, is in east Afghanistan close to the border with Pakistan, the ITAR-TASS news agency said Monday, citing unnamed intelligence sources.
Bin Laden is located near the Afghan city of Jalalabad, 120 kilometers (75 miles) east of Kabul, and has several fortified and camouflaged bases in the region, ITAR-TASS quoted "security experts" as saying.
On Sunday Afghanistan's ruling Taliban said bin Laden, whom the United States has accused of organizing the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington that left nearly 7,000 people dead, had "disappeared."
Washington is believed to be considering strikes against targets in Afghanistan following the Taliban's failure to meet a demand that they hand bin Laden over to "responsible authorities."
Meanwhile ousted Afghan president Burhanuddin Rabbani has sent a delegation to Italy to negotiate with the former Afghan king Mohammed Zaher Shah, a spokesman for the Afghan government in exile told AFP in the Tajikistan capital Dushanbe.
"The objective is to discuss whether a provisional government could be set up in Afghanistan, Mahajuddin Mehdi, the deputy Afghan ambassador in Dushanbe, said -- MOSCOW (AFP)
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