Fake vaccination ploy used to trap Bin Laden: Report

NEW YORK: The CIA ran a fake vaccination programme in the Pakistani town of Abbottabad, where it believed Osama bin Laden was hiding, to obtain DNA information of his family members in order to determine whether the al-Qaeda chief was in the compound, a media report said today.

The programme was run by a Pakistani doctor, Shakil Afridi, whom Pakistani spies have since arrested for his suspected collaboration, The New York Times reported.

An American official said he remains in custody. The American official said that the doctor managed to temporarily gain access to the compound, but he never saw bin Laden and was not successful in getting DNA samples from any bin Laden family members.

Getting DNA samples from the compound would have allowed the Americans to match those to the samples they already have of bin Laden's family members, and this would have offered evidence of his presence in the compound.

Before launching the high-risk operation against bin Laden, US officials wanted to test DNA samples from people living at the compound with a sample that they had from his sister.

Bin Laden was killed on May 2 in a raid that soured US-Pakistan relations.

The US has suspended nearly USD 800 million in military aid to Pakistan following its reluctance to go full throttle in the war on terror.