Pakistan's bin Laden report blames 'incompetence' for letting terrorist slip by

Institutional failures across the board and "gross incompetence" in the military led to terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden slipping past Pakistani authorities and allowed the U.S. to carry out an "act of war" against the country, a government report released Monday by Al Jazeera English claims.

The Abbottabad Commission's findings suggest that investigators suspect some level of "complicity" with bin Laden in Pakistan's institutions, Al Jazeera's Phil Rees said in an interview Monday.

"It admits that it found no proof, but it also admits that it's out of its power to be able to determine that," he said.

"There's a sense of disbelief in the report... It's even sarcastic at times," Rees went on. "It even says that Osama bin Laden was so fortunate to find every level of Pakistan's institutions and security apparatus not doing its job properly."

"I sense members of the committee believe that someone was complicit," he added.

The report also outlines in considerable detail how America's campaign of unannounced drone strikes within Pakistan frayed the relationship between the two nations leading up to the raid on the bin Laden compound in Abbottabad. It particularly highlights the outrage over a CIA agent named Raymond Davis who killed two Pakistanis, but the U.S. defended with claims of diplomatic immunity.

It also cites the drone strikes and "several other actions" that "made clear how aggressive and 'kinetic' its policies had become in brazen disregard of human rights, and international law." By the time U.S. forces hit the compound in Abbottabad, tensions were so high that America taking out it's top foreign enemy without preclearance was widely viewed as the U.S. trying to "stab Pakistan in the back."

Still, contrary to popular belief in Pakistan, where millions believe the event was staged and bin Laden wasn't really killed, the Abbottabad Commission admits that all the evidence, including DNA analysis and video footage of bin Laden's personal belongings, points to bin Laden in fact being the target of that night's raid.

"Finding: OBL was present at the Compound when the US operation took place," it concludes, adding that he was definitely killed by U.S. soldiers.

This video is from Al Jazeera English, broadcast Monday, July 8, 2013.

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[Photo: AFP]