page_title: Osama bin Laden's compound in Abbottabad
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Osama bin Laden's compound in Abbottabad / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Osama bin Laden Compound
context_page_description: Osama bin Laden's compound, known locally as the Waziristan Haveli, was an upper-class mansion that was used as a safe house for militant Islamist Osama bin Laden, who was shot and killed there by U.S. forces on May 2, 2011. The compound was located at the end of a dirt road 1,300 metres southwest of the Pakistan Military Academy in Bilal Town, Abbottabad, Pakistan, a suburb housing many retired military officers. Bin Laden was reported to have evaded capture by living in a section of the house for at least five years, having no Internet or phone connection, and hiding away from the public, who were allegedly unaware of his presence.
  Completed in 2005, the main buildings in the compound lay on a 3,500-square-metre plot of land, much larger than those of nearby houses. Its perimeter was 3.7- to 5.5-metre concrete walls topped with barbed wire, and there were two security gates. The compound had very few windows. Little more than five years old, the compound's ramshackle buildings were badly in need of repainting. The grounds contained a well-kept vegetable garden, rabbits, some 100 chickens and a cow.
context_section_description: Gulf News reported that it had previously been used as a safe house by Inter-Services Intelligence, but was no longer being used for this purpose. ISI alleged that this compound was raided in 2003 while under construction as Abu Faraj al-Libbi was suspected of living there. However, this account was disputed by American officials who said that satellite photos show that in 2004 the site was an empty field. The compound was believed to be built around the summer of 2005 to late 2006, based on local accounts, most likely completed in late 2005 as intelligence reports indicate Bin Laden may have moved into the house on 6 January 2006. 
  American intelligence officials discovered bin Laden's whereabouts by tracking one of his couriers, Abu Ahmed al-Kuwaiti. Information was collected from Guantánamo Bay detainees who gave intelligence officers al-Kuwaiti's pseudonym and said that he was a protégé of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. In 2007, U.S. officials discovered the courier's real name, and, in 2009, that he lived in Abbottābad. Using satellite photos and intelligence reports, the CIA surveilled the inhabitants of the compound. In September, the CIA concluded that the compound was "custom built to hide someone of significance" and that it was very likely that bin Laden was residing there. Officials surmised that he was living there with his youngest wife. U.S. Intelligence estimates that bin Laden lived in the compound for five or six years. Bin Laden's wife confirmed to the Pakistani authorities that they had lived in the compound for five years. Prior to moving to the compound, they lived in the village of Chak Shah Muhammad, in the nearby Haripur District, for nearly two and a half years.
caption: Another view of the compound
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