Bin Laden could be dead or very ill

Osama bin Laden

SYDNEY - A terrorism expert says he has seen evidence showing that al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden is either seriously ill or dead.

Dr Clive Williams, director of terrorism studies at the Australian National University, says documents provided by an Indian colleague suggest bin Laden died of massive organ failure in April last year.

"It does seem reasonably convincing based on the evidence that I've been provided with that he's certainly either severely incapacitated or dead at this stage," Dr Williams told ABC radio. He said that Ayman al-Zawahiri, bin Laden's deputy who was the target of a United States air strike in Pakistan last week, had been making all statements on behalf of the terror network for the past year.

But Dr Williams conceded that proving whether the terrorist leader was still alive might be impossible.

"It's hard to prove or disprove these things because there hasn't really been anything that allows you to make a judgment one way or the other.

"But it does seem strange that Dr Zawahiri has been making all of the statements since then, and nothing's been heard from bin Laden since, I think, the December of the year before."

Dr Williams said even if bin Laden was dead, those who upheld the same philosophies would continue to fight for their cause.

US senators yesterday defended the purported CIA airstrike that Pakistani officials said killed at least 17 people in a village near the border with Afghanistan.

"We apologise, but I can't tell you that we wouldn't do the same thing again" in going after Zawahiri, said Republican Senator John McCain.

Senator McCain said it was a "cautionary tale" about the fate of the terrorist network's leaders that the US "didn't take them out year ago". He said the US must hunt them down wherever they were hiding.

"We have to do what we think is necessary to take out al Qaeda, particularly the top operatives. "

This guy has been more visible than Osama bin Laden lately," Senator McCain said on the CBS show Face the Nation.

Pakistani officials have strongly condemned the strike. The White House declined comment yesterday, and officials at several US agencies have not provided details about the attack.

The FBI expected to do DNA tests on the victims, a law enforcement official said.

Islamic groups staged demonstrations across Pakistan to denounce the attack. A protest in Karachi drew 10,000 people, and chants of "Death to America" were heard.

Osama Bin Laden: dead or alive?
* Blamed by the US for the September 11, 2001 terror attacks.
* Bounty of US$25 million for his capture.
* On October 29, 2004, the Arab television network Al Jazeera broadcast a video of bin Laden.
* Ayman al-Zawahiri, bin Laden's deputy, was reported as saying in a message posted on an Islamist website in December 2005 that the group's leader was alive and still leading their "holy war against the West".

- AAP