Musharraf rejected Afghan intelligence on Abbottabad four years ago

He said they believed bin Laden must be there based on “thousands of interrogation reports” and the assumption that Osama “a millionaire with multiple wives and no background of toughness” would not be living in a tent.

“I was pretty sure he was in the settled areas of Pakistan because in 2005 it was still very easy to infiltrate the tribal areas,and we had massive numbers of informants there,” he said. “They could find any Arab but not Bin Laden.”

Their intelligence became more precise in 2007 when they believed he was hiding in Manshera,a town a short distance from Abbottabad where the NDS had identified two al-Qaida safe houses.

But the former spy chief said that Musharraf,then president of Pakistan,was outraged at the suggestion that bin Laden was hiding in such a prominent part of the country.

Recounting a meeting between Musharraf and Afghan President Hamid Karzai,the report said,the Pakistani president became furious and smashed his fist down on the table.

“He said,’Am I the president of the Republic of Banana?” Saleh recalled. “Then he turned to President Karzai and said,’Why have you have brought this Panjshiri guy to teach me intelligence?’

He said Karzai had to intervene as Musharraf got increasingly angry and began to physically threaten Saleh.

However,Musharraf has maintained that he had no idea that bin Laden was hiding in Pakistan.

“I do understand that because he being there in the town of Abbottabad is surprising. It surprises me also.

However,having said that,I am very sure that there is no complicity involved in this,” Musharraf told MSNBC on Thursday.

Saleh also said he had no doubts that Mullah Omar,the leader of the Taliban movement,was hiding in a safe house owned by the ISI in Karachi.

“He is protected by ISI,General Pasha [Lieutenant-General Ahmad Shuja Pasha,director-general of the ISI knows as I am talking to you where is Mullah Omar and he keeps daily briefs from his officers about the location of senior Taliban leaders,simple,” he said.

54-year-old bin Laden was killed in a unilateral operation by special US forces in Abbottabad near Islamabad early on Monday.