Al-Qa’ida’s leader, Osama bin Laden, was seen in southern Afghanistan days before US forces launched an operation to find him and members of his network, a former Taliban diplomat claimed yesterday. Amid continuing confusion over reports that two of Bin Laden’s sons had been caught after a shootout with Pakistani forces last week, the former Taliban official said the boys’ father had been in the same region. Naseer Ahmed Roohi said he had information from “reliable sources” that Bin Laden had been present in the mountains straddling the south-western Afghan provinces of Nimruz and Helmand and Pakistan’s Baluchistan region. “But Bin Laden, along with a few companions, shifted to an unknown area, just days before the US-led operation in the area,” Mr Roohi said. Full Story