Bin Laden health rumors swirl anew

Is Osama bin Laden seriously ill? Dying or already dead? Or is he perfectly healthy?

The world began wondering again Saturday about the health of the elusive Al-Qaida leader, who has not been seen in two years or heard from since June.

The speculation was stirred by a newspaper report on a French intelligence memo saying that Saudi security agents believe Bin Laden might have died of typhoid fever last month in Pakistan.

French President Jacques Chirac said the report was "in no way whatsoever confirmed."

The United States and several allied governments also expressed skepticism about the authenticity of the claims, which have been made numerous times before and proved erroneous.

On Saturday, the French newspaper L'Est Republicain quoted a memo from France's foreign intelligence service, the DGSE, as saying, "Saudi intelligence services seem to be sure that Osama bin Laden is dead."

The newspaper said the memo cited an uncorroborated report from a single but "usually reliable source."

The document, dated Thursday, was sent to Chirac and other top French officials, the newspaper said.

Chirac responded to questions from reporters Saturday by saying, "This information is in no way confirmed, in no way whatsoever, and I have no comment to make about it."

Saudi Arabia's Interior Ministry also offered no details. "I've heard the reports, but I have no information at all. I have no idea," spokesman Mansour al-Turki said.

In Washington, Tony Snow, the White House spokesman, said he could not confirm news reports of bin Laden's death.

But two U.S. intelligence officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue, said U.S. agencies had no information to suggest Bin Laden was dead or dying. "We can't confirm this," said one U.S. official. "I think it ought to be treated with a great deal of skepticism."

Afghan and Pakistani officials also cast doubt on the report.

The Bin Laden mystery

Several reports of Bin Laden's death have surfaced since he went into hiding in 2001. Many people suspect he and other Al-Qaida leaders are somewhere in the Pakistani mountains along the border with Afghanistan.

Among previous reports, Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf said during the U.S.-led offensive that toppled Afghanistan's Taliban regime in late 2001 that he was "reasonably sure" Bin Laden had been killed by U.S. bombing raids on the Tora Bora caves.

Bin Laden also was rumored to have kidney problems, but a doctor detained by Pakistan on suspicion he was treating top Taliban and Al-Qaida militants told the Associated Press in December 2002 that the Al-Qaida leader was in excellent health when the physician saw him a year earlier.

The Washington-based IntelCenter, which monitors terrorist communications, said Saturday that it was not aware of any Internet reports speculating about Bin Laden.

"We've seen nothing from any Al-Qaida messaging or other indicators that would point to the death of Osama bin Laden," IntelCenter director Ben N. Venzke said.

IntelCenter said the last time it could be sure Bin Laden was alive was June 29, when Al-Qaida released an audiotaped eulogy for Al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, killed by a U.S. airstrike in Iraq earlier that month.

But some scholars who closely monitor Bin Laden suspect that recording was spliced from old ones.

"I'm not convinced any of the tapes we heard in 2006 are new," said Bruce Lawrence, a Duke University professor and author of the book, "Messages to the World: The Statements of Osama bin Laden."

Lawrence, who has been described as one of the world's leading Al-Qaida archivists, added that "there's something staged and strange" about the wording and style of some of the recently released tapes.

Bin Laden's last video appearance was in October 2004, when the Al Jazeera satellite TV channel aired footage of him appealing directly to Americans just before the U.S. presidential election.

The newspaper report

According to the newspaper report, the document from DGSE, or Direction Generale de la Securite Exterieure, said, "The chief of Al-Qaida was a victim of a severe typhoid crisis while in Pakistan on August 23, 2006."

His geographic isolation made medical assistance impossible, the French report said, adding that his lower limbs were allegedly paralyzed.

According to the document, Saudi security services were first notified of the death on Sept. 4 and were pursuing further details, notably the place of Bin Laden's burial.

The New York Times, Associated Press and McClatchy News Service contributed to this report.