Slain British aid worker Linda Norgrove in shown in this 2009 photo provided by Gerard Russell, in the Wakhan corridor in northeastern Afghanistan.
(Courtesy Gerard Russell)
Officials: Aid Worker Killed By American Grenade, Not Suicide Bomber
Linda Norgrove Died During Rescue Attempt By US Special Forces in Afghanistan
Doubts About Norgrove Rescue Raid
But the shift of blame to American special operations forces sparked new doubts in London and Kabul about whether the raid should have been launched in the first place.
U.S. officials say they launched the raid for two reasons: they were worried Norgrove would be taken to Pakistan, where the U.S. military does not openly operate, and that there was a "very real, direct threat that they would kill her," according to one Western official in Kabul.
And local officials say they also believed insurgents intended to take Norgrove across the border -- and were not going to negotiate until they did so.
The house where she was being held is only about two dozen miles from Pakistan. Intelligence officials had enough information to surround the area, according to three western officials, essentially restricting the militants' movement.
But in the past, American special operations forces have tried to keep militants penned inside Afghanistan, according to one Western official, and failed – New York Times reporter David Rohde was taken across the border into North Waziristan, and Sergeant First Class Bowe Bergdahl is believed to have been taken to the same Pakistani tribal area.
"Those on the ground and in London feared that she was going to be passed up the terrorist chain, which would increase further the already high risk that she would be killed," Cameron said.
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Norgrove, the daughter of a charity worker and an engineer, led a $150 million program in eastern Afghanistan, where she worked with a team to build roads and bridges and improve the capabilities of district governments. Her friends and colleagues described her as deeply respectful toward Afghanistan and its culture, eschewing the kinds of security measures that most Westerners take -- especially in the part of the country where she worked.
"Linda had extraordinary composure and inner strength," said Nick Horne, who hiked with Norgrove in northeastern Afghanistan last summer. She had come to love the country so much during her previous time living here, she took three weeks of her annual leave to spend in the Wakhan corridor with three friends.
She left Afghanistan after that trip but returned in January to run the program for Development Alternatives Inc. (DAI), a well-known contractor for the United States International Agency for Development. Westerners working for NGOs and contracting firms such as DAI in Afghanistan have had to severely restrict their movements in the last year and a half as violence in eastern and northern Afghanistan increased rapidly.
Many aid workers say that in the northern and eastern parts of the country, they often can't go to small villages today they used to be able to visit just a year ago.
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