U.S. seeks elusive bin Laden

WASHINGTON, Dec. 7 (UPI) -- The U.S. war strategy in Afghanistan may include a renewed push to capture or kill al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden, the U.S. national security adviser said.

James Jones, the top security adviser to U.S. President Barack Obama, said in a Sunday interview on CNN that Washington believes bin Laden is hiding out in the tribal regions of Pakistan along the border with Afghanistan.

Bin Laden reportedly escaped the mountains of Tora Bora in Afghanistan ahead of a U.S.-led strike shortly after the American invasion in 2001.

Asked if part of the war strategy for Afghanistan unveiled by Obama last week included a "more determined" effort to take on the al-Qaida leader, the national security adviser responded in the affirmative.

"I think so," he said.

Pakistani Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani said during a meeting with the British premier last week, however, that that he did not think the al-Qaida leader was in Pakistan.

A captured member of the Taliban in Pakistan, meanwhile, claimed to have known someone who met with bin Laden in January in the southeastern Afghan province of Ghazni.

Pakistani journalists said they doubted the claims he was in Afghanistan.