Pakistan president on Bin Laden killing: "It was not a joint operation"

The president of Pakistan said the raid that killed Al Qaeda leader was not a joint operation with his country.

In a column that appeared in Washington Post on Monday, President Asif Ali Zardari said he rejected that Islamabad failed in fighting terrorism.

The 55-year-old leader wrote the location of the slain Osama Bin Laden was not known to Pakistani authorities.

"He was not anywhere we had anticipated he would be, but now he is gone.

"Although the events of Sunday were not a joint operation, a decade of cooperation and partnership between the United States and Pakistan led up to the elimination of Osama bin Laden as a continuing threat to the civilized world.

Zardari also said that his country paid a heavy price fighting terrorism. It was not only a political war but a personal battle for the president.

"Justice against Bin Laden was not just political; it was also personal, as the terrorists murdered our greatest leader, the mother of my children. Twice he tried to assassinate my wife."

About 30,000 innocent civilians, 2,000 police officers and a generation of social progress was lost due to terrorism, he continued.

Reacting to the US press that his administration lacked the capacity to pursue terrorist activities, the president wrote, "Such baseless speculation may make exciting cable news, but it doesn’t reflect fact.

"Pakistan had as much reason to despise al-Qaeda as any nation. The war on terrorism is as much Pakistan’s war as it is America’s. And though it may have started with bin Laden, the forces of modernity remain under serious threat."

Details of this report here.