Terror Arrest Yields Bounty Of Info
FBI and CIA experts continued to dig Tuesday through computers and piles of other information from the Pakistani home of alleged Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, searching for clues that new terror strikes might be imminent.
Recovered at the home in Rawalpindi were computers, disks, cell phones and documents. Authorities believe the materials will provide names, locations and potential terrorist plots of al Qaeda cells in the United States and around the world, and lead them to al Qaeda operatives who may be planning new attacks.
Mohamed, perhaps the most senior al Qaeda member after Osama bin Laden and his deputy Ayman al-Zawahri, was captured as he slept early Saturday. Pakistani Ahmed Abdul Qadus and the unidentified financier also were detained.
Pakistan Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said Mohammed was handed over Tuesday to U.S. authorities, who took the alleged No. 3 man in al Qaeda to their interrogation center at Bagram, the main American military base in Afghanistan. The United States has refused to confirm Mohammed's whereabouts.
Attorney General John Ashcroft hailed Mohammed's arrest as "a severe blow to al Qaeda that could destabilize their terrorist network worldwide."
Ashcroft told the Senate Judiciary Committee that "next to (Osama) bin Laden, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed was the FBI's most wanted terrorist."
The Judiciary Committee was hearing about the developments Tuesday in testimony from Ashcroft, FBI Director Robert Mueller and Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge.
Mohammed was questioned Monday by U.S. authorities seeking information about safe houses and hideouts used by the al Qaeda terror network, a Pakistani intelligence official said.
He is alleged to have organized the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and was linked to a 1995 plot to bomb trans-Pacific airliners and crash a plane into CIA headquarters and to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. He also has been tied to the April bombing of a synagogue in Tunisia, which killed 19 people, mostly German tourists.
Mohammed was believed by U.S. officials to have details about the group's finances.
He could also turn out to be the man who murdered Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, a Pakistani intelligence official said. One of the men who led police to Pearl's body identified Mohammed as being involved.
Mohammed had been plotting attacks against targets in the United States and Saudi Arabia in the weeks before his capture, U.S. counterterrorism officials contended.
Such attacks might have been against commercial or other lightly defended civilian targets, officials said, although they acknowledged they did not know whether al Qaeda targets had been selected.
Intelligence about Mohammed's activities led in part to the orange alert that lasted most of February, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge said.
Mohammed was not the only big catch in recent weeks by American and Pakistani authorities: U.S. officials say another senior al Qaeda operative and a suspected financier of the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon also have been taken into custody.
The alleged senior operative, Mohammed Omar Abdel-Rahman, is a son of the blind Egyptian sheik accused of inspiring the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center.
Government officials said the younger Adbel-Rahman ran a training camp in Afghanistan before the Sept. 11 attacks. He was considered a senior al Qaeda operative, perhaps one tier below Mohammed.
President Bush said Monday the capture of Mohammed shows that America's war on terrorism is succeeding, and promised to pursue the terror network until it's dismantled.
But there are also worries that Mohammed's capture may not end the planning of future attacks. The Washington Post reports authorities are concerned that his nephews — the brothers of imprisoned terrorist Ramzi Yousef — may be ready to take over planning of future terror attacks.
They have worked closely with Mohammed in handling al Qaeda communications, travel and financial transfers, sources said, and move easily around the Middle East.
Officials also expressed concern that al Qaeda cells could accelerate plots in the United States and elsewhere rather than run the risk of being captured. Or cell members might also go into hiding, believing their security was compromised by Mohammed's capture.
The military does not comment on individual prisoners, even to confirm their presence, and they will not say how many suspects are being held at the base or under what conditions.
Some said he was taken directly to Bagram Air Base after his capture in Pakistan, joining an unknown number of al Qaeda and Taliban suspects at a secret holding facility. Others said he spent the first few days in Pakistan, where he was questioned by Pakistani authorities.
U.S. military officials acknowledge the existence of the Bagram holding facility — and a similar one at a U.S. base in the southern city of Kandahar — but say little more.