Deported: Saudi accepts OBL family on humanitarian grounds

OBL children are not involved in terrorist operations: Saudi officials.

JEDDAH: Saudi Arabia accepted the three widows and children of slain al Qaeda chief on humanitarian grounds, a Saudi-owned daily reported on Saturday.

Citing a senior Saudi official, the London-based Asharq al Awsat said the kingdom “dealt with Bin Laden’s wives on humanitarian grounds”, adding that the authorities were confident that they and the children ‘were not involved’ in the operations of the terrorist group.

The widows – two Saudis and a Yemeni – reached on Friday with their children, after being expelled from Pakistan.

Saudi Arabia has not officially confirmed their arrival yet. Yemen’s ambassador to Islamabad, Abdo Abdulrahman, however told the newspaper that ‘bin Laden’s family arrived in Saudi Arabia on Friday morning on a private plane’.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 29^th, 2012.