What Pakistan's ISI doesn't want the world to know about Osama bin Laden's couriers

Kotkai, Pakistan – Osama bin Laden’s couriers, Arshad and Tariq Khan – who were killed alongside him during the raid on his compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan – were born and raised in Kuwait after their Pakistani father settled there to become an imam, according to relatives and other residents in their ancestral village.
The residents’ accounts, confirmed by a Pakistan security official, suggest the couriers may have become radicalized in Kuwait. Meanwhile, the residents also report being intimidated by intelligence agencies, which are under the spotlight today after a prominent Pakistani journalist has been found dead.
Pakistan’s intelligence agencies swooped in to detain cousins and other close relatives of the couriers from Kotkai, a village in Pakistan’s mountainous Shangla district last week – weeks after Mr. bin Laden’s death on May 2. A similar raid in the city of Lahore picked up a handful of relatives.
Residents in Kotkai say they were warned not to speak to the media about the people who were taken away, and many remain shaken by the events.
“We were visited by security officials last week and we were told we shouldn’t speak to the media," says a school teacher who asked that his name be withheld for fear of reprisal. "People here are very afraid that they could be picked up next.”
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Speaking on condition of anonymity, residents and close relatives of the men told the Monitor that the men’s father, Manjoor Khan, migrated to Kuwait in 1970 to become an imam employed by Kuwait’s religious affairs department and changed his name to the more Arab-sounding Ahmad Syed al-Kuwaiti.
Previous reports have placed the Khan brothers, known to the neighbors in Abbottabad as the popular “Khan-jees,” as residents of Charsadda or the North Waziristan tribal region.
In addition to Arshad and Tariq, al-Kuwaiti fathered four more sons, one of whom, Ibrahim, returned to the village to get married some 15 years ago. The other brothers were said to have not returned.
Intimidation campaignThe intimidation effort is likely an attempt to minimize Pakistan's negative image in light of the bin Laden raid.
Pakistan’s intelligence agencies inspire fear and respect among large segments of the population.
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