Pakistan to grant US access to bin Laden widows

China.org.cn, May 10, 2011

Pakistani government officials have informed their US counterparts that they will soon get access to Osama bin Laden's three widows, ABC news quoted an anonymous US official as saying.

The U.S. has been asking Pakistan for access to three of Osama bin Laden's wives, who have been in Pakistani custody since last Sunday. The US National Security Adviser Tom Donilon said information from three women could reveal the day-to-day life of bin Laden.

The White House has also requested Pakistani authorities to give US investigators access to some of the al-Qaida data that Navy SEALs left behind, according to a report of ABC News.

Pakistani Foreign Ministry said Sunday that the government officials were still interrogating wives and children of bin Laden and no country had sought their extradition so far, according to a website report of a local English newspaper The Nation.

Pakistani Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani on Monday told the parliament that a high level investigation has been ordered into the presence of bin Laden in the country's northwestern city of Abbottabad, Xinhua reported.

Making a policy statement on the US Special Forces operation to kill the al-Qaida chief in the National Assembly, the prime minister admitted failure of the Pakistani intelligence agencies to find out bin Laden.

US President Barack Obama announced on May 1 that bin Laden was killed by US forces at a compound in the Pakistani town of Abbottabad, which is located close to the capital, Islamabad.