For example: "Where are the 28 surviving people we are told were in the compound in Abbatabad at the time of the raid? Theoretically they would be able to provide an enormous amount of background information on the raid and life with bin Laden.
"As Navy SEALs swept through the compound early Monday, they handcuffed those they encountered with plastic zip ties and pressed on in pursuit of bin Laden. After killing the terror leader, his son and two others, they doubled back to move nine women and 23 children away from the compound, according to U.S. officials.
Those survivors of the raid are now 'in safe hands and being looked after in accordance to the law,' the Pakistani government said in a statement. 'As per policy, they will be handed over to their countries of origin." It did not elaborate." click here
Of all these people, only bin Laden's wife, Amal Ahmed Abdulfattah seems to have had anything to say. But, oddly, she is not quoted directly, but through someone else:
"He used two rooms on one of the floors," Asad Munir, a former officer from Pakistan's ISI intelligence agency, told ABC News. "He never went anywhere."
When I first saw this, I was struck by the fact that Mr. Munir was neither identified as a journalist, or a Pakistani official. He was simply said to formerly have been an ISI intelligence official, the equivalent of our CIA.
After doing a little research, it turns out that Mr. Munir does seem do be an active freelance journalist in Pakistan (in addition to having been a party in a land deal between Pakistan and Canada http://www.canadainternational.gc.ca/pakistan/highlights-faits/highlights-faits_2009-02-24.aspx?lang=eng). But the statement appearing to be from Mrs. bin Laden, is only actually attributed to Mr. Munir. When I saw this same quote in articles both in the NY Post as well as the UK's Guardian, I realized that Mr. Munir had the plum role of passing on anything from those allegedly in custody, but wasn't performing this function in any official capacity. He is not a current Pakistani official, nor was he briefing those foreign journalists who were not allowed to be present at the Pakistani news conference on the raid. It was indeed remarkable that no one felt the need to hide the fact that our news media was wholly relying on nothing more than an ex-intelligence officer for "official" information on the other alleged members of the compound.
If he's no longer a Pakistani intelligencer officer, or any kind of official, but just one of many, many Pakistani journalists (although not even identified as one in the articles)... why is he in this position?
