The Sunday Times September 24, 2006
John Follain, Paris, and Christina Lamb
PRESIDENT Jacques Chirac ordered an investigation last night into the leaking of a French intelligence report that suggested Osama Bin Laden, the Al-Qaeda leader, may have died from typhoid in Pakistan last month.
The eight-line document, which was published yesterday in a French provincial newspaper, L’Est Républicain, was greeted with sceptisim by security and government officials from the United States to Pakistan itself.
Yet the DGSE, the French secret service, had judged the report significant enough to send it on September 21 to the offices of Chirac and the prime minister, Dominique de Villepin. The report claimed that “a usually trustworthy source“ had persuaded the Saudi secret service Bin Laden was dead.
“The head of Al-Qaeda, while he was in Pakistan on August 23, 2006, reportedly suffered a very strong case of typhoid which led to a partial paralysis of his lower limbs. His geographical isolation, caused by a permanent flight, reportedly made any medical assistance impossible,“ the report said.
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http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-2372390,00.html