Assistant to Russian President Vladimir Putin Nikolai Patrushev said in an interview with Vesti that Moscow once participated in a joint operation with the United States to eliminate the leader of the Al-Qaeda terrorists, Osama bin Laden. According to Patrushev, the FSB then fulfilled its part of the plan, but the CIA did not.
Bin Laden, considered the number one terrorist at the beginning of the 21st century after his participation in organizing the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States, was killed in 2011. The operation in the Pakistani city of Abbottabad was carried out by American special forces.
Patrushev did not specify when the operation to eliminate bin Laden with the participation of Russia was being prepared, but emphasized that the United States “did not dare” to strike the terrorist at that time. According to Patrushev, the plan was agreed upon by the presidents of Russia and the United States. The video version of the interview showed footage of Putin and George W. Bush, who headed the White House from 2001 to 2009.
“Each service was assigned its own role: on the one hand there was the CIA, on the other hand the FSB. They asked us to install a beacon to the place where it is located. And they had to strike and eliminate him. It was such an agreement,” Patrushev told Vesti.
According to Putin’s aide, colleagues in the CIA were confident that the FSB “would not solve the problem,” but the Russian intelligence service managed to direct the strike. Patrushev added that Washington subsequently did not explain why they did not eliminate bin Laden, who was supposed to be in the designated location for at least three months.
“But we know that he is their agent and for the time being they used him, and at the moment when he began to interfere with them, simply compromising the activities of the special services, they eliminated him,” Patrushev said.
