Compound where Osama was found

US forces finally found al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden not in the rugged mountains of Afghanistan's border, but in a million-dollar compound, with his youngest wife, U.S. officials said early on Monday.

They were led to the fortress-like three-story building after more than four years tracking one of bin Laden's most trusted couriers, whom U.S. officials said was identified by men captured after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.

"Detainees also identified this man as one of the few al Qaeda couriers trusted by bin Laden. They indicated he might be living with or protected by bin Laden," a senior administration official said in a briefing for reporters.

Bin Laden was finally found -- more than 9-1/2 years after the 2001 attacks on the United States -- after authorities discovered in August 2010 that the courier lived with his brother and their families in an unusual and extremely high-security building, officials said.

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"When we saw the compound where the brothers lived, we were shocked by what we saw: an extraordinarily unique compound," a senior administration official said.

"The bottom line of our collection and our analysis was that we had high confidence that the compound harbored a high-value terrorist target. The experts who worked this issue for years assessed that there was a strong probability that the terrorist who was hiding there was Osama bin Laden," another administration official said.
The home is in Abbotabad, a town about 35 miles (60 km) north of Islamabad.

The building, about eight times the size of other nearby houses, sat on a large plot of land that was relatively secluded when it was built in 2005. When it was constructed, it was on the outskirts of Abbotabad's center, at the end of a dirt road, but some other homes have been built nearby in the six years since it went up, officials said.

WALLS TOPPED WITH BARBED WIRE

Intense security measures included 12- to 18-foot (3.6 meters to 5.5 meters) outer walls topped with barbed wire and internal walls that sectioned off different parts of the compound, officials said. Two security gates restricted access, and residents burned their trash, rather than leaving it for collection as did their neighbors, officials said.

Few windows of the three-story home faced the outside of the compound, and a terrace had a seven-foot (2.1 meter) privacy wall, officials said.

"It is also noteworthy that the property is valued at approximately $1 million but has no telephone or Internet service connected to it," an administration official said. "The brothers had no explainable source of wealth."

U.S. analysts realized that a third family lived there in addition to the two brothers, and the age and makeup of the third family matched those of the relatives -- including his youngest wife -- they believed would be living with bin Laden.

"Everything we saw, the extremely elaborate operational security, the brothers' background and their behavior and the location of the compound itself was perfectly consistent with what our experts expected bin Laden's hide-out to look like," another Obama administration official said.

A small U.S. team conducted a helicopter raid on the compound on Sunday afternoon, officials said. After 40 minutes of fighting, bin Laden and an adult son, one unidentified woman and two men -- identified as the courier and his brother -- were dead, officials said, and Obama was preparing a television address to the nation.

Source: Geo

Osama Bin Laden Dead: Inside the Top Secret Operation

Osama Bin Laden Dead: Inside the Top Secret Operation

 

Royal newlyweds share first public kiss

Prince William & Kate balcony kisses complete wedding

 If you looked away from the screen for a moment, you probably missed it. It was a quick smooch. Kate turned to her groom, said something with a smile, and the prince reached over, rather hurriedly, and gave her a very quick kiss.

Maybe that's why he kissed her again.
The second kiss came just before the Royal Air Force flyover. Another first on a historic day: two kisses on the Buckingham Palace balcony by a newly married royal couple.

All eyes were on Prince William and Kate as they emerged from the palace onto the  balcony. Many among the boisterous gathered crowd and those watching around the world surely had one defining image in their minds: Princess Diana and Prince Charles' memorable wedding kiss.
It wasn’t traditional for royal couples to kiss in public following their weddings before the summer of 1981. And Prince Charles reportedly resisted breaking tradition when the crowds outside Buckingham Palace that historic July morning called out for them to kiss.
“I am not going to do that caper. They are trying to get us to kiss,” he said to Diana.
Diana’s reported response: “Well, how about it?” The prince hesitated, then said “Why ever not?”

And this image lives on as proof.
Sadly, the marriage did not live up to the sweetness of that first public kiss. And because of that, there is a lifetime of hope wrapped up in today’s royal smooch. The world wishes so much better for this young couple. They have come to marriage older, wiser, and by all accounts, truly in love.
The grand balcony has been the stage for vaulted royal appearances since 1851, when Queen Victoria stepped out onto it during celebrations for the Great Exhibition in Hyde Park, London. The Great Exhibition was the first in a series of World’s Fair displays of culture and industry and attended by the likes of Charles Darwin and Charlotte Brontë.
Princess Anne was the first of Queen Elizabeth’s newly wed children to appear on the balcony with her new spouse, Captain Mark Phillips, in 1973. But they did not kiss.
Neither did Prince Edward and Sophie Wessex on their 1999 wedding day, though Prince Andrew did follow his elder brother’s lead when he kissed the Duchess of York on the balcony on their wedding day in 1986.
A new iconic royal kiss image is born. Long live the marriage.

Source: Yahoo