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Bush has ordered CIA to kill bin Laden: Report

United States President George Bush has directed the Central Intelligence Agency to eliminate Saudi terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden and destroy his Al Qaeda network, senior government officials in Washington said.

Bush signed an intelligence order in September directing the CIA to undertake the 'most sweeping and lethal covert action', calling for the destruction of bin Laden and his Al Qaeda network, the officials were quoted as saying by the Washington Post daily.

The officials also said that Bush has allotted over $1 billion to the CIA's war on terrorism, most of it for the new covert action, the report said.

US intelligence has identified new and important specific weaknesses in bin Laden's organisation that are not publicly known, and these vulnerabilities will be the focus of the lethal covert action, the officials said.

The CIA and the US armed forces are collaborating at 'an unprecedented' level to carry out the order, the daily said in a banner-headlined dispatch.

Bush's order, called an intelligence 'finding', instructs the CIA to attack bin Laden's communications, security apparatus and infrastructure, the officials said.

"The gloves are off," one senior official told the daily. "The president has given the agency the green light to do whatever is necessary. Lethal operations that were unthinkable pre-September 11 are now underway."

In issuing the orders targeting bin Laden, Bush has said he wants the CIA to undertake high-risk operations, according to the report.

He has told his advisers that he is willing to risk failure in the pursuit of ultimate victory, even if the results are some embarrassing public setbacks in individual operations, the officials were quoted as saying.

The overall military and covert plan is intended to be massive and decisive, the officials said.

The report said US intelligence agencies had, in the last spring, obtained high quality videos of bin Laden with his distinctive beard and white robes surrounded by a large entourage at one of his known locations in Afghanistan.

But neither the CIA nor the military had the means to shoot a missile or fire weapons at him while he was being photographed.

Since then, the CIA-operated 'Predator' unmanned reconnaissance aircraft with high-resolution cameras has been equipped with Hellfire anti-tank missile that can be fired at targets of opportunity.

The technology was not operational at the time bin Laden was caught on video, the report said.

PTI

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