WASHINGTON, D.C. Sept. 14 (DPI) – Libyan Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens was killed Tuesday at a consulate in the Libyan city of Benghazi, a high-risk area long known as a trouble spot even before the ouster of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi last year.

So the question in Washington security circles this week was why Stevens was in Benghazi that day, the eleventh anniversary of the September 11 attacks, and with violence already erupting in other parts of the Arab world over a video that deliberately insulted Islam and inflamed its followers.

That question will never be answered due to ongoing security protocols, a State Department official said Wednesday.

The State Department official said privately Wednesday that it was “surprising” and “odd” that Stevens would have been allowed to travel to Benghazi at a time when the risk of violence was so great.

The deaths of Stevens and three other Americans at the Banghazi consulate are now reported to be the result of attacks by Al Qaida-linked extremists who used the broader protest as a diversion, The NY Times cited US intelligence sources as saying.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/13/world/middleeast/us-envoy-to-libya-is-reported-killed.html?hp

http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2012/09/12/slain-ambassador-warned-in-08-about-extremists-near-benghazi/