Bin Laden imitates a dead man for last year

AFP:

He has not issued any public statement all year. Speculation has grown over his influence, health and even possible death. Where is the Western world's most wanted man, Osama Bin Laden?

The Al-Qaeda leader's period of silence is the longest since the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, offering no clues to the whereabouts or fate of a man who this year appears to have quietly slipped off the radar.

Bin Laden has not been heard of since a December 27, 2004 audiotape in which he anointed Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, Iraq's most wanted man, as Al-Qaeda's leader in the war-torn country.

Just before, on December 16, 2004, a video surfaced where he also called on his fighters to strike Gulf oil supplies and warned Saudi leaders they risked a popular uprising.

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It should be noted tht the attempted popular uprising in Sadia Arabia has been a failure and disaster for al Qaeda. That alone would be enough for him to head his face in shame, not to mention the organizations defeat in AFghanistan and Iraq and the capture of its operatives in the US and Europe. You would have to say bin Laden has had a bad war the last 12 months.