The story of a Pakistani journalist who interviewed Osama bin Laden three times

Seven weeks after the September 11, 2001 attacks, Hamid Mir stood before a man accused of plotting and carrying out attacks from unknown locations in Kabul. It was the last interview he did with Osama bin Laden. 

 The interviews took place in the midst of other attacks against the United States. But this was not the first meeting between the Pakistani journalist and al Qaeda leader. 

 The first time Mir met Bin Laden, he did not know much about him. After the second meeting he found out he was a "very dangerous man." By the time he interviewed her the third time the world had completely changed. Asked if he was afraid to do the interview, he said he feared the bombing more than the al Qaeda leader.

How did you get in touch with Osama bin Laden?

It is a long story. In 1997 I wrote a paper about how the United States supported the Taliban and that it was pressuring the Pakistani government to support them, and they wanted to use them to provide protection to the US oil company, Unocal.

When my article was published, the then Prime Minister of Pakistan, Benazir Bhutto, called me to try to explain his position, saying he did not support the Taliban movement but only helped them for strategic reasons.

He also added that his government was not friendly to Afghanistan but was protecting the Turkmenistan-Pakistan oil pipeline.

He directed me to his interior minister, General Naseerullah Khan Babar, who repeated what the Prime Minister had said.

He offered to help me meet some Taliban leaders in Kandahar (Afghanistan) and eventually I went to meet them.

They were outraged by my statement.

They told me that Iranian Radio was quoting Hamid Mir, who wrote a statement claiming the Taliban were working for the Americans.

Then they asked me: "Do you know that we are protecting the greatest enemy of the United States?

I said I don't know who it is. "Osama bin Laden," they replied.

At the time I did not know him

Have you ever heard of him?

No, I did not know anything about him. And that's when I wrote his name for the first time.

They told me they could arrange a meeting between me and Osama, on the condition that after that I not write that they were working for the Americans. I said, "Well, no problem."

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