Al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden had a support network in Pakistan, President Barack Obama told CBS’ “60 Minutes,” but the United States is still trying to determine whether it extended to government or intelligence officials.
“We think that there had to be some sort of support network for bin Laden inside of Pakistan, but we don’t know who or what that support network was,” the president said in a video clip released Sunday afternoon. “We don’t know whether there might have been some people inside of government, people outside of government, and that’s something that we have to investigate and, more importantly, the Pakistani government has to investigate.”
The Pakistani government has expressed “profound interest” in discovering more about the support networks, the president said. But he warned that answers won’t come immediately.
“But these are questions that we’re not going to be able to answer three or four days after the event,” he said. “It’s going to take some time for us to be able to exploit the intelligence that we were able to gather on site.”
The interview, which was taped last week, was Obama’s first since U.S. forces killed the al-Qaida leader in a raid on his compound in Pakistan on May 1. The program will air more from the interview at 7 p.m. EDT Sunday.
Rep. Bill Cassidy has his blood drawn by Alesha Barbour during a free hepatitis screening in the Rayburn House Office Building hosted by the Congressional Viral Hepatitis Caucus to recognize "National Viral Hepatitis Testing Day."
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