Page 10 - aruba-today-20190302

A10 WORLD NEWS
Saturday 2 March 2019
Saudi Arabia revokes citizenship of Hamza bin Laden

By JON GAMBRELL November, according to a on a house in Abbottabad,
Associated Press circular by the Interior Min- Pakistan, in 2011.
DUBAI, United Arab Emir- istry quietly published Fri- For Hamza bin Laden, now
ates (AP) — Saudi Arabia day by the country's official believed to be around 30,
announced Friday it had gazette. State-run media in his father initially worried for
revoked the citizenship of the kingdom did not report his safety and thought to
Hamza bin Laden, the son on the decision. send him away for study,
of the late al-Qaida leader Bin Laden is believed to but his son instead "wants
who has become an in- have been born in 1989, to get into the fight," Jos-
creasingly prominent figure the year of the Soviet with- celyn said. He's then sent
in the terror network. drawal from Afghanistan, away for explosives training
There was no immediate where his father became in Pakistan.
explanation why the royal known among the mujahe- Video released by the CIA
decree stripping his citizen- deen fighters. His father re- in 2017 that was seized dur-
ship, signed in November, turned to Saudi Arabia and ing the Abbottabad raid
was only becoming pub- later fled to Sudan after shows Hamza bin Laden
lic now. However, the an- criticizing the kingdom for with a trimmed mustache
nouncement comes after allowing U.S. troops to de- but no beard, at his wed-
the U.S. government on ploy in the country during ding. Previous images
Thursday offered a $1 mil- the 1991 Gulf War. He later have only shown him as
lion reward for information fled Sudan for Afghanistan a child. The State Depart-
leading to his capture as in 1996, where he declared ment said in its announce-
part of its "Rewards for Jus- war against the U.S. ment Thursday about the
tice" program. As leader of al-Qaida, Osa- $1 million bounty on him
The kingdom similarly ma bin Laden oversaw a that it believes he married
stripped Osama bin Lad- series of attacks, including the daughter of Mohamed
en's citizenship in 1994 while the 1998 bombings of the Atta, the lead hijacker in
living in exile in Sudan when U.S. embassies in Kenya the Sept. 11 attacks.
Hamza bin Laden was just and Tanzania, as well as the Hamza bin Laden began
a child. Where he is now re- This wanted poster released by the U.S. Department of State Re- bombing of the USS Cole appearing in militant vid-
mains in question. wards for Justice program shows Hamza bin Laden. off Yemen. He and others eos and recordings in 2015
"This is an example of his- Associated Press plotted and executed the as an al-Qaida spokesman.
tory rhyming," said Thomas Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on "If you think that your sinful
Joscelyn, a senior fellow State group. "He's basically Qaida and the launching New York and the Penta- crime that you committed
at the Washington-based born right after al-Qaida is of its war against the West gon, which led to the U.S. in Abbottabad has passed
Foundation for Defense of founded, so his life is totally and America." invasion of Afghanistan. without punishment, then
Democracies who studies consumed in the establish- Saudi Arabia revoked Ham- U.S. Navy SEALs ultimately you thought wrong," he said
al-Qaida and the Islamic ment, the formation of al- za bin Laden's citizenship in killed bin Laden in a raid in his first audio recording.q

More people emerge from last IS-held territory in Syria

der five years of age, have liphate that once stretched camp in southern Syria
died since December on over large areas of Syria where tens of thousands
their way to al-Hol camp and Iraq, the Islamic State suffer from lack of food and
in northeastern Syria after group has been reduced medical supplies.
fleeing the extremist group to a tiny speck of land in the Col. Gen. Mikhail Mizintsev
in Syria's Deir el-Zour prov- village of Baghouz, where said the Syrian convoys
ince. a few hundred IS militants were heading on Friday
In the last week alone, it are holed up with family to the Rukban camp and
said, some 13,000 peo- members and other civil- urged the U.S. military in
ple have arrived at al-Hol ians who are among the the area to secure their
camp. group's most determined safe passage. Russia has
"Many of the arrivals are ex- supporters, many of whom accused the U.S. of failing
hausted, hungry and sick," traveled to Syria from all to provide humane condi-
said Jens Laerke, spokes- over the world. tions in the camp, which is
man of the U.N. Office for U.S. President Donald home to about 40,000 peo-
the Coordination of Hu- Trump falsely claimed on ple.
In this Aug. 4, 2016, file, photo, people gather to take basic food manitarian Affairs (OCHA), Thursday that IS has lost Mizintsev said the U.S. mili-
stuffs and other aid from community leaders charged with dis-
tributing equitably the supplies to the 64,000-person refugee at a news briefing in Ge- 100 percent of the territory tary would bear "full respon-
camp called Rukban on the Jordan-Syria border. neva. it once controlled in Syria. sibility for the safe passage"
Associated Press The evacuation of men, On the ground, the group of convoys through its zone
women and children continues to cling to its last of control.
By SARAH EL DEEB the United Nations about comes amid an ongoing piece of territory, with civil- The Russian military said it
Associated Press the plight of thousands standoff between the mili- ians, mostly women and will work together with the
OUTSIDE BAGHOUZ, Syria who have fled the area in tants and the U.S.-backed children, trickling out on al- Syrian army to escort the
(AP) — More civilians evac- recent weeks. Syrian Democratic Forces most daily basis. convoys as they head to
uated from the last territory In a statement, the U.N. besieging them in a small In Moscow, the Russian mili- temporary accommoda-
held by the Islamic State cited reports that more sliver of land along the Eu- tary said the Syrian govern- tion centers for refugees es-
group in eastern Syria Fri- than 84 people, two thirds phrates River. ment was sending convoys tablished in several Syrian
day, amid a warning by of them young children un- From a self-proclaimed ca- to evacuate a refugee provinces.q