Bin Laden living a relaxed, comfortable existence in Iran apartment

http://www.news.com.au/world/bin-laden-living-a-relaxed-comfortable-existence-in-iran-apartment-documentary-claims/story-e6frfkyi-1225862175752

Bin Laden living a relaxed, comfortable existence in Iran apartment, documentary claims
Ed Barnes
May 04, 2010
Osama bin Laden apparently living in Tehran
Living free life with wife, several children
Documentary maker gave details to army

THE world's most wanted terrorist, Osama bin Laden, has been living a relaxed and comfortable existence in an apartment in Iran since at least 2003, according to a new documentary.

The al-Qaeda leader is healthy, surrounded by his wife and a few of his children and has only four bodyguards in Tehran, where he is living under the protection of Iran's Revolutionary Guard, according to the documentary Feathered Cocaine, FOXNews.com reported.

It presents a very different picture to the one the world is most familiar with since bin Laden disappeared in 2001 - that of the terrorist living in a damp cave in northern Pakistan.

Alan Parrot, the film's subject and one of the world's foremost falconers, makes the case that bin Laden, an avid falcon hunter is pursuing the sport relatively freely in Tehran.

Parrot, who was once the chief falconer for the Shah of Iran and who has worked for the royal families of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, used his contacts in Iran to talk about bin Laden's life there. One of those contacts, described as a warlord from the north of Iran and disguised in a balaclava, reveals in the film that he has met bin Laden six times on hunting trips inside Iran since March 2003.

He says the world's most wanted terrorist is relaxed and healthy and so comfortable that “he travels with only four bodyguards.”

Parrot told FOXNews.com that the warlord, who supplies the falcon camps bin Laden visits on hunting forays, agreed to talk only because one of Parrot's men had saved his life.

"This was the repayment," Parrot said. "He was asked to talk. He wasn’t happy about it.”

The last confirmed meeting between bin Laden and the warlord was in 2008, Parrot says.

“There may have been more since then, but I haven’t talked to my source since we left Iran,” he said.

To prove his case, Parrot says he managed to get telemetry settings for bin Laden's falcons and could locate the leader to a one-square-mile area using those unique signals. He provided the data to the US Government but says he was never contacted about it.

Major Sean Turner, a Pentagon spokesman, said the US military would not comment on the whereabouts of bin Laden.

Parrot's story is supported in the documentary by former CIA agent Robert Baer, an outspoken critic of US policy in the Middle East on whom the film Syriana is based.