President Barack Obama travelled to the CIA headquarters Friday to pay tribute to seven agents killed in a suicide attack in Afghanistan, Central Intelligence Agency officials said. The president arrived at the Langley, Virginia headquarters of the agency at 10:30 am (1530 GMT) along with journalists, who were not allowed to attend the ceremony in the ultra-secret US intelligence nerve centre.
CIA officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, confirmed Obama attended the memorial along with relatives of the seven agents. They were killed in a suicide attack in Afghanistan on December 30, when a Jordanian double agent who had been brought to the US base in Khost after promising to share intelligence on al Qaeda blew himself up. The bomber, Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, had convinced his Jordanian handlers he had put his militant past behind him and was ready to cooperate with US forces, while instead he was actually planning the deadly attack.
Seven Americans and one Jordanian intelligence officer were killed in the deadliest attack on the CIA since 1983. The Washington Post reported that a senior CIA expert on al Qaeda, a 45-year-old female agent with three children, was among those killed. Six others were injured in the attack, including the CIA's second-in-command in Afghanistan, the Post reported, citing US officials.
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