A suicide bomber who killed eight people in an attack on a CIA base in Afghanistan was a triple agent who apparently duped his handlers that boasts he wanted to die a martyr were just a cover, reports said.
The Jordanian intelligence services had brought the bomber to eastern Afghanistan with the specific mission of finding Al-Qaeda number two, Ayman al-Zawahiri, believing he was their double agent, US network NBC News reported late Monday, citing Western intelligence officials.
But instead he blew himself up at Forward Operating Base Chapman in Khost province near the Pakistani border, killing seven CIA agents and a top Jordanian intelligence officer and wounding six other people.
The killings marked the US Central Intelligence Agency's worst single loss of life since the bombing of the US Marine barracks in Beirut in 1983.
??Too soon??
The US embassy in Yemen has reopened after “successful counter-terrorism operations” by Yemeni security forces north of the capital on Monday.
The embassy had closed on Sunday in response to what it had said were al-Qaeda threats, with the British and French embassies following suit.
On Tuesday, the US embassy said on its website that Yemeni security forces had addressed a “specific area of concern”.
The British and French embassies are operating but closed to the public.
“Successful counter-terrorism operations conducted by the government of Yemen security forces January 4 north of the capital have addressed a specific area of concern, and have contributed to the embassy’s decision to resume operations,” the US embassy said.
The statement apparently referred to an operation on Monday, some 25 miles north of Sanaa, in which two suspected members of al-Qaeda were killed.
The difficulties of travel within Yemen have prevented the BBC from independently verifying details of the raid.