Osama bin Laden and Taliban leader Mullah Omar are alive and in Afghanistan, a former Taliban diplomat told reporters today.
"Osama is alive and perfectly alright," Naseer Ahmad Roohi, former first secretary at the Afghan embassy in the United Arab Emirates during the Taliban, told a small group of journalists at a clandestine location in Peshawar, northwest Pakistan.
"I can say the same about Mullah Omar, who is alive and in Afghanistan," Roohi said. "I met him in Afghanistan 15 days ago to receive instructions from him," he said, without disclosing the location of the meeting.
Bin Laden and the one-eyed Omar disappeared after the fall of the Taliban government in December and have not been found despite a massive manhunt by US and allied forces in Afghanistan and neighbouring Pakistan.
"Mullah Omar never left Afghanistan since this time (of the September 11 attacks last year)," said Roohi. He added that Omar and bin Laden were in contact with each other.