Bin Laden silence frustrates US agents

The US has admitted it has lost track of Osama Bin Laden, a month after believing he was trapped in caves.

Officials say Washington is becoming increasingly frustrated over the virtual absence of intelligence on his whereabouts.

The most recent sign of him was in early December, when agents believe they overheard him directing troops by radio in Tora Bora, Afghanistan.

Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has accused Iran of allowing other al-Qaida fighters to escape to the west, but the White House believes bin Laden is alive and hiding in either southeastern Afghanistan or in Pakistan.

US security officials say if the terrorist leader had died, the remnants of the al-Qaida network would be overheard discussing his death in telephone or radio transmissions.

Another reason he is believed to be alive, officials said, is that there has been no convincing evidence that he is dead, despite a €28.7m reward for such information.

With bin Laden remaining elusive, President George Bush has recast his war aims.

"Osama bin Laden is not my focus," Bush said. "My focus is terror at large." And in his State of the Union speech he did not even mention bin Laden by name, simply delivering a general warning to terrorists.

Some senior officials have noted the US has frequently stumbled whenever one person has been made the object of American foreign policy. President Bush's father ran into difficulty in Panama in 1989, when Manuel Noriega briefly slipped through America's grasp.

"I think everyone knew from the beginning how hard it was going to be to get one person, and we knew we shouldn't put so much emphasis on Osama bin Laden," said one American official. "But it is too late for that now."