WASHINGTON: The White House rejected has rejected a report which claimed that the official US version of the raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound was a cover up and termed it as “baseless” a report.
“There are too many inaccuracies and baseless assertions in this piece to fact-check each one,” White House National Security spokesman Ned Price said in a statement.
President Barack Obama announced on May 2, 2011, that SEALs had killed the Al Qaeda leader the same night in a helicopter raid. The elite commandos flew in under cover of darkness from Afghanistan as the administration decided not to consult or inform Pakistan about the operation.
The White House rejected journalist Hersh’s assertion that the CIA and other US agencies collaborated with the Pakistani military to kill bin Laden.
“As we said at the time, knowledge of this operation was confined to a very small circle of senior US officials. The President decided early on not to inform any other government, including the Pakistani government, which was not notified until after the raid had occurred,” Mr Price said.
“We had been and continue to be partners with Pakistan in our joint effort to destroy Al Qaeda, but this was a US operation through and through.”
