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CNN Live Saturday

Northern Alliance Narrows Down Bin Laden's Location

Aired December 01, 2001 - 15:01   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CATHERINE CALLAWAY, CNN ANCHOR: Well, we start the hour with the hunt for Osama bin Laden. For days now, top U.S. officials have suggested that bin Laden is probably hiding out in eastern Afghanistan, the Tora Bora area; al Qaeda said to have an elaborate underground complex in that region.

But today, the Northern Alliance seemed to narrow bin Laden's location to three provinces in southern Afghanistan, the same general area where U.S. Marines have set up camp.

Well, CNN's Ben Wedeman reports now from the Afghan capital of Kabul.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (on camera): A senior Northern Alliance official says the Alliance knows where Osama bin Laden is and where he isn't. Northern Alliance foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah told a press conference in Kabul Saturday that Osama bin Laden is somewhere in southern Afghanistan in one of the three or four provinces still under Taliban control.

He said that according to the information the Alliance has, that the al Qaeda organization and the Taliban are preparing to wage guerrilla warfare from the mountains of that rugged area.

ABDULLAH ABDULLAH, NORTHERN ALLIANCE FOREIGN MINISTER: He is in southern Afghanistan, still in southern Afghanistan, and his people are active still and I think they are planning to move toward the mountainous areas of Khalad (ph), Zabul province, as well as Kandahar.

So, they are making preparations for a guerrilla warfare. This is our understanding, our reading of the situation with the Taliban as well as those army groups. I believe that some of his lieutenants are in the Tora Bora and some of his followers, but not he himself.

WEDEMAN: Meanwhile, he says that the Alliance does not believe that Osama bin Laden is in the Tora Bora area, a very rugged, mountainous area to the south of Jalalabad near the border with Pakistan.

This certainly does narrow down the hunt for Osama bin Laden to a much smaller area.

Ben Wedeman, CNN, Kabul.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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