WikiLeaks suggests Pak Army officials knew about Laden's hideout

WikiLeaks has suggested that mid-ranking Pakistani army officials may have known about Osama bin Laden's hideout in Pakistan, but official US statements do not back that up.

Various leaked e-mails from the US intelligence firm Stratfor hints that Laden might have been in constant touch with Pakistan military and intelligence agents prior to his death in May last year.

WikiLeaks had published five million internet e-mails of the Texas-based company on Monday, although Stratfor has refused to comment on the published content.

"Mid to senior level ISI and Pak Mil with one retired Pak Mil General that had knowledge of the OBL arrangements and safe house," a Stratfor employee was quoted, as saying in one of the published e-mails.

The e-mail goes on to suggest that up to 12 agents may have known about this, but does not reveal their names, The Christian Science Monitor, reports.

The employee adds that the US could use the information as a bargaining chip after the raid, which took place in the garrison town of Abbottabad and created uproar inside Pakistan as well as a great deal of embarrassment to Pakistani intelligence agencies.

The authorities began demolishing the compound last weekend, in what analysts called an effort to wash away a reminder of that embarrassment. It was also suggested that Pakistan felt that the hideout may be developed as a shrine by Osama's admirers.

Pakistan army spokesman Gen. Athar Abbas has strongly repudiated the e-mails.

"It's rubbish and tantamount to kite flying, much farther from the truth," he told the Monitor.