In the days after 9/11, the world’s most wanted man retreated to Afghanistan. What happened to his wives and children?
On 10 September 2001, Osama bin Laden’s wives were ordered to pack one suitcase each. No one would say why, only that their husband wanted to move them and his youngest children away from Kandahar. His older sons were to join their father and other brothers at an undisclosed location. The only boy left behind was nine-year-old Ladin, a timid child who flinched at the sound of gunfire. He, the women and other children filed on to a corroding Soviet-era bus smeared with mud, setting off on a dirt track parallel to the Silk Road.
When the engine stops, you get off, Osama told them.
The children fought over a battered Nintendo or scanned their father’s transistor for snatches of Madonna
Osama’s grandsons pelted guards with stones, shouting, 'We have been illegally kidnapped and hidden in this secret jail'
Slipping off her niqab, Iman swaddled a doll as if it were a baby, and made her escape
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