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World leaders hail killing of Osama bin Laden

Last Updated 04 May 2018, 01:33 IST

US President Barack Obama who announced to the world the slaying of the world's most prominent terror mastermind said, "justice has been done", while his predecessor George W Bush hailed it as a "momentous" achievement.

Describing the killing of bin Laden at the hands of US forces as a "resounding victory for justice", Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said, "The state of Israel joins the American people on this historic day in celebrating the elimination of Osama Bin Laden".

Afghan President Hamid Karzai said today that Osama bin Laden had "paid for his actions".

British Prime Minister David Cameron said it would "bring great relief to people across the world".

"It is a great success that he has been found and will no longer be able to pursue his campaign of global terror," Cameron said in a statement today.

Welcoming the death of bin Laden as "significant progress of counter-terrorism measures", Japan's Foreign Minister Takeaki Matsumoto said today that the country welcomed the death of Osama bin Laden as "significant progress of counter-terrorism measures".

"I pay respect to the US officials concerned," Matsumoto said in Paris, according to a Japanese foreign ministry statement.

Warning that the fight against terrorism had not ended, Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard said the death of Osama bin Laden had hurt but not finished Al-Qaeda.
"Whilst Al-Qaeda has been hurt today, Al-Qaeda is not finished. Our war against terrorism must continue," Gillard said.

"Osama bin Laden declared war on innocent people and today he has paid the price for that declaration," Gillard was quoted as saying by a 'Herald Sun' report.

The death of the mastermind behind the worst-ever terror attack on US soil in 2001, "is a victory of good over evil, of justice over cruelty," Italy's Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said today.

He said it was a "victory of good over evil, of justice over cruelty. It's a victory of the free world and democracy."

Vowing to step up its cooperation with the US in the fight against terror, Russia has hailed the death of bin Laden as a great success.

"The Kremlin welcomes the serious success the United States achieved in the war against international terrorism," President Dmitry Medvedev's press service said in a statement today.

Osama bin Laden's death at the hands of US forces is a "victory for all democracies fighting the abominable scourge of terrorism", France's foreign minister said today.

"The scourge of terrorism has suffered a historic defeat but it's not the end of Al-Qaeda," President Nicolas Sarkozy added in a separate statement.

"The combat against the criminals who claim to form part of it should continue without respite and unite all the states who are victims of these crimes," he said.

Iran said the death of Osama bin Laden has removed "any excuse" for the US and its allies to deploy forces in the Middle East under the pretext of fighting terrorism.

"US and their allies have no more excuse to deploy forces in the Middle East under pretext of fighting terrorism," foreign ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast was quoted as saying on the website of Iran's English-language Press TV channel.

He said Iran hopes this development will help to "establish peace and security in the region," adding that it is Iran's policy to "strongly condemn terrorism all over the world."

In Cairo, Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, a conservative organisation with links around the Islamic world, has condemned the killing of bin Laden by US forces as an "assassination."

The Brotherhood, which seeks the establishment of a state run according to Islamic principles through peaceful means, is Egypt's most powerful and organised political movement.

The statement said the group "is against violence in general, against assassinations and in favour of fair trials."

Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia says it hopes the killing of militant leader and former Saudi citizen bin Laden will boost efforts to fight terrorism.

The Saudi Press Agency carried an official statement expressing hope that bin Laden's death with be a "step that supports the international efforts against terrorism."

It added that the Saudi people in particular were targeted by "this terrorist organisation," referring to bin Laden's al-Qaida, which once had an active branch in the desert kingdom.

A scion of a prominent Saudi family, bin Laden was stripped of his citizenship after he criticised the royal family's reliance on US troops to protect it after the Iraqi invasion of neighbouring Kuwait.

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(Published 02 May 2011, 05:07 IST)

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