After April 2004: Unknown Important Al-Qaeda Figure Has House Raided in Abbottabad, Pakistan

A second attempted raid is made on al-Qaeda leader Abu Faraj al-Libbi in Abbottabad, Pakistan, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf will describe in a 2006 memoir. In April 2004, Pakistani intelligence discovered al-Libbi was living in Abbottabad, but it raided only one of his three houses there and missed him (see April 2004). Later in 2004, Pakistani intelligence is tipped off that some important al-Qaeda figure is living in a certain Abbottabad house, and someone else important is supposed to meet him there. Al-Libbi is the visitor, but he sends a decoy to check out the situation first. The decoy is shot and killed, al-Libbi doesn’t show, and the al-Qaeda figure living at the house apparently gets away. Musharraf will not mention if it is ever determined who this person is. [Musharraf, 2006, pp. 211] Al-Libbi will be captured in Pakistan a year later (see May 2, 2005). Osama bin Laden begins living in Abbottabad around late 2005 (see Late 2005-Early 2006). His trusted courier Ibrahim Saeed Ahmed already lives there in 2004 (see January 22, 2004-2005).