US has to seek its elusive most wanted everywhere (bin Laden in Iran)

Much of the story behind Saddam Hussein's eight months on the run has yet to be made public. But US military and intelligence officials say the Iraqi dictator never wandered far from the banks of the Tigris.

Remaining within his Sunni heartland, he scrambled from one farmhouse to the next, sometimes by car or van, sometimes by boat.

By contrast, Osama bin Laden, leader of the al-Qaeda terrorist group, appears to have become far more adept at evading the manhunt.

The US is unshaken in its resolve to find its other most-wanted fugitive. Earlier this month, General Richard Myers, chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff, vowed that he "will be captured some day, just like we captured Saddam Hussein".

But Gen. Myers went on to say that the al-Qaeda leader was likely to be hiding out "where he has some support, where he can buy support, and probably in very difficult terrain".

The common belief is that this terrain lies somewhere on the 1,500-mile frontier between Pakistan and Afghanistan, a wild and lonely place. The terrorist chief and a handful of his followers could be anywhere in the high mountain passes or the tribal lands where neither the writ of Islamabad or Kabul counts for much.

But sporadic and un-confirmed sightings of have also begun to crop up further afield, including in Kashmir, Pakistan's tribal areas and Baluchistan on the border with Iran.

Even if these do not amount to a reliable guide to his whereabouts, they are a tribute to his elusiveness. In one recent account, a man with links to Iran's intelligence services and hard-line Revolutionary Guard Corps (RGC) has told the Financial Times that he saw the al-Qaeda leader in Iran two months ago. He saw him arrive at an RGC guest house close to the small town of Najmabad, west of Tehran, on 23 October.

The al-Qaeda leader, accompanied by Ayman al-Zawahiri, his deputy, was being driven by RGC officers when they arrived at the guest house, a 90-minute drive from Tehran.

A meeting taking place in the building was suddenly halted to allow the two men to use it. The witness said both men had subtly changed their appearances, with trimmed beards and short hair. Neither wore traditional turbans, he said, and both were dressed in Pakistani-style clothes and carrying long shawls across their shoulders.

Senior Iranian security officials strenuously deny the claims. The country is holding an unknown number of al-Qaeda activists, and has provided a list of names to the United Nations.

But it has denied that any senior al-Qaeda figures are among those being detained, and says those in the country are under house arrest.

Hamid Reza Asefi, a spokesman for the Iranian foreign ministry, said: "It is a baseless allegation and is not true at all. It is a fictitious interview with an unknown eyewitness. It is like a fantasy. Any group with any sort of interest does not back bin Laden in Iran, and he has no room in Iran."

The vehemence of the Iranian denial is a reflection of how seriously the country - which George W. Bush, US president, defined as a part of an "axis of evil" - views any accusation that could make it a target of US action. Officials within the reformist government of President Mohamed Khatami also deny that Mr bin Laden has ever been in Iran.

Mr Khatami's strong suspicion of al-Qaeda's Sunni fundamentalism has fed fears that Iran could itself become a target for the Saudi terrorist leader's organisation.

The man who reported the Najmabad sighting said he did not think the government knew about the alleged visit, and added that rogue hardliners in the Revolutionary Guard may have organised it independently.

But a senior Iranian security official said: "There have been so many similarly false stories that said bin Laden has been in Tabriz or Qazvin, but they were rumours. People tantalised by the $25m [offered by the US as a reward] have created these myths."

But western intelligence officials are not so sure. One said the main focus of the search remained the Pakistani-Afghan border region but "it is not out of the question that he is in Iran, as we know he has been able to move around".

Those chasing Mr Hussein struggled to find him in the Sunni triangle, north of Baghdad. Those pursuing Mr bin Laden do not have the luxury of restricting their search to one district - or even to one country.

This was likely the source of Mansoor Ijaz's claim on Brit Humes's show. If bin Laden survived the bombings at Tora Bora, he and Ayman al-Zawahiri are now under the protection of the IRGC and have been laying low in Iran and have been laying a false trail this whole time by directing all of the search efforts towards Pakistan-Afghanistan border.

Here's a primer on the organization that's protecting them:

http://www.fas.org/irp/world/iran/qods/index.html

The location also fits with where al-Qaeda military commander Saif al-Adel is said be hiding out:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/s995457.htm

I read a similar report last week in Geostrategy Direct - they said that OBL was seen in Iran in the company of the IRGC, and that he had taken to wearing all black. He supposedly has also died his hair and beard black, as well as gained some weight.

There just is no other single place on this planet that would fit OBL's agenda as well as Iran. This way he is close to the action in Iraq as well as in Pakistan - but not too close.

OBL is no dummy ... he surely wasn't sitting in Tora Bora ... he knows the Taliban training camps in Afghanistan would be a primary target after 9/11 ... and then he knows Tora Bora would be a target, and since it was designed by the USA, we'd know the entrances and exits too ...

OBL would find those most sympathetic to his "cause" either in Mecca or Medina, Saudi Arabia (two places the USA would not go except if a WMD was used) or somewhere in Pakistan ...

he doesn't use a cell phone or a satellite phone because he knows our satellites and aircraft are listening ... if OBL is dead, and the "video tapes" seem to be some proof, since they appear to be old footage, I would be surprised if he was dumb enough to wait at Tora Bora ...

Don't get me wrong ... I hope he's deader than a ten-penny nail ... Ramzi Yousef and Khaled Shaikh Mohammed didn't wait at Tora Bora ... they were in Pakistan ... OBL and/or his lieutenants could stay in the basement of Mecca for years, issuing orders by word-of-mouth, moving money by their manual system, surrounded by hundreds if not thousands of fanatics all willing to sacrifice themselves for his "cause" ... (and 72 dark-eyed, perpetual virgins, of course) ...

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