US State Department gives Osama bin Laden new look

The US State Department updates its 1998 file photo of the al Qa'eda leader Osama bin Laden, digitally altering it to account for a decade of age and possible changes.

WASHINGTON // The US State Department has updated its 1998 file photo of the al Qa'eda leader Osama bin Laden, digitally altering it to account for a decade of age and possible changes in his facial hair. There is a $25 million (Dh91m) bounty on bin Laden's head for the September 11, 2001 attacks and the 1998 US embassy bombings in Tanzania and Kenya. Bin Laden is now 52 and he is believed to be hiding in the lawless Pakistan frontier bordering Afghanistan, though his exact whereabouts have been unknown since late 2001, when he and a small contingent of bodyguards walked out of the Tora Bora mountains, evading air strikes and US special forces and Afghan militias. The photos and bounty on bin Laden is on the State Department's website.

* AP