Interaction sends letter to CIA head protesting use of vaccination plot to find Bin Laden in Pakistan

"An alliance of 200 U.S. aid groups has written to the head of the CIA to protest against its use of a doctor to help track Osama bin Laden, linking the agency's ploy to the polio crisis in Pakistan," the Guardian reports, noting Pakistan recorded the highest number of polio cases in the world last year. The CIA used a "fake vaccination scheme in the town of Abbottabad ... in order to gain entry to the house where it was suspected that the al-Qaida chief was living, and extract DNA samples from his family members," the newspaper writes. But the plan "provided seeming proof for a widely held belief in Pakistan, fuelled by religious extremists, that polio drops are a western conspiracy to sterilize the population," according to the Guardian.

"'The CIA's use of the cover of humanitarian activity for this purpose casts doubt on the intentions and integrity of all humanitarian actors in Pakistan, thereby undermining the international humanitarian community's efforts to eradicate polio, provide critical health services, and extend life-saving assistance during times of crisis like the floods seen in Pakistan over the last two years,' the InterAction coalition wrote [in a letter (.pdf)] to the CIA director, David Petraeus," the newspaper writes. InterAction includes the International Rescue Committee, Mercy Corps and CARE, the Guardian notes (Shah, 3/2).