Welcome to Spycraft, a podcast that tells gripping life and death spy stories and the amazing devices and operations that made them possible. Now let's get started. Welcome back everybody. Today, we're gonna be looking at a CIA operation with a spy. It was a Pakistani doctor. Before we get started. To make sure of sharing subscribe, I hit that like button. We truly appreciate it and thank you for all the support. The CIA recruited a Pakistani doctor named Shaquil a Freedi afr Idi who organized a vaccination campaign and a Badabad. Now it was a fake one. The CIA operatives in Pakistan had focused on a Battle Dad and they had their eyes on what was later revealed to be Osama bin Laden's residence, but before mounting a covert operation with the Seals, they needed to be sure. This is where the doctor came in. He was financed to set up a hypotitis B vaccination campaign in the area. According to journalist, the idea was to get some tissue sample from the subjects during vaccination. That tissue DNA would be compared to Osama bin Laden's family is obtained from his sister in Boston. In twenty ten. If there was a match, this would provide biological evidence of the presence of the family members in the area, and then, of course the probable existence of Osama bin Ladden. The vaccination program was started in a poor section of the city, so they would seem a routine operation and no suspicions would be aroused. Then had slowly moved towards the target. A nurse named much Huttar BB gained access to that bin Laden compound, but it's not clear whether she managed to get biological samples. However, the later successful operation of killing Osama been lad In a few days later indicates that the program did succeed. In twenty twelve, the then US Defense Secretary also publicly acknowledged on TV the crucial role of Doctor of Freedy and hunting down Bin Laden. However, there are some anti climactic moments in the story. First, as the story broke, Doctor of Freedy was hailed as a hero in subparts of the western world, but he was probably arrested in at Pakistan for treason, and later other charges were added. He has been languishing in jail ever since, and we're going to be looking at his latest state from an article in April twenty nine, twenty twenty one. He is still languishing in that jail. Pressure by the Western grew so completely failed to secure his release. The Western institutions. Institutions have also lost interest in him, unfortunately, and their efforts are now reduced him here lip service according to some. Secondly, this is much more serious. As the story broke, the local population became highly wary of vaccination programs. People in many areas of Pakistan now refuse vaccination, especially if backed by Western institutions. The net result was a resurgence of polio in Pakistan. Humanitarian workers in the US has expressed deep resentment at this misuse of public health programs for counter espionage purposes. Again, today's episode is really talking about doctors and spy in the spy world, how they're used. So doctors who became spies and Doctor of Freed he was technically a spy in this case, not the ones we usually cover. So let's see what happened to Doctor of Freedy. He helped to see I again. Track Bessama bin Laden is a Bottabad and compound and is now in languishing in a jail. According to Hussein Hakhani, who served as Pakistan's ambassador to Washington, says he's being kept in prison now only to teach every Pakistani a lesson not to cooperate with Western intelligence. The raid that led to the death of Bin Laden was a huge embarrassment for Pakistan and particularly for the Pakistani army, because it really didn't know what was happening. And you know, you had US forces on Pakistani territory and they left and nothing happened. And this was a huge embarrassment to the entire Pakistani military. So clearly Pakistan had to do something to appease the very angry public. And what did it do. It looked for a scapegoat Patsy really hailing from Pakistan's rugged travel areas. A physician, appeared to be the ideal one for the CIA as a spy agency zeroed in on Ben Lan's hideout. All the Americans needed was a bit of proof, as we mentioned, and that was the DNA sample. Now we have a free edy in jail. He was never found guilty of anything linked to the raid, but convicted by a tribal court under obscure colonial Arral law of providing money to an insurgent group. This is where the story gets a little bit complicated because he's being charged for helping another group, an insurgent group called Lashkar e Islam and lash Car's as militants in the nearby Khaiber tribal region. His family has denied the charges because they said he gave them money. He also gave him assistance medically. He said. The only money of Freedy ever gave Lashkar e Islam was a ransom payment worth the equivalent of six thousand dollars to secure his own release after the militant group kidnapped him in two thousand and eight. He was sentenced to thirty three years imprisoned by a tribal court, although this was later reduced to twenty three years on appeal. A Freedy is imprisoned in a jail in Pakistan's eastern Sahawa district. His lawyer says a Freedy faces severe restrictions in that jail. Pakistani officials described ben Laden's long presence and a bought of that as a security lapse and rejected any suggestion that members of the military or intelligence were complicit and hiding him. So you can see the complexity of the spy world and in this case, using doctors and creating a fake vaccination program. What do you think there to justify the tactics to be able to catch Osama? Ben law him or not. Fascinating story indeed, M