Kabul, Mar 19: Al-Qaeda leaders Osama bin Laden and Ayman Al-Zawahiri are safe and in Afghanistan, not neighbouring Pakistan where an intense manhunt is under way, a Taliban spokesman said on Friday.
Speaking by satellite phone from southern Afghanistan, Abdul Samad dismissed speculation by Pakistani officials that Al-Zawahiri could be surrounded in the Pakistan border district of south Waziristan, saying he was "100 per cent" sure the Al-Qaeda number two was safe.
"All these reports about Ayman Al-Zawahiri being surrounded in Pakistan are not true, they are just propaganda by the US coalition and by the Pakistani army to weaken Taliban morale," he said.
"They are all safe and they are on this side of the border," Samad said of the top Al-Qaeda leadership. Afghan military commanders in border regions said on Friday that activities had increased along the porous frontier, believed to be the hiding place of Taliban and Al-Qaeda terrorists.

Pakistan has unleashed a deadly assault on its tribal Waziristan border region in an effort to trap or kill Al-Qaeda personnel and their Taliban allies.
Bureau Report