Posted on 01/11/2007 9:13:09 PM PST by NormsRevenge
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Al Qaeda's leaders are Holed up in a secure hide-out in Pakistan, from which they are revitalizing their bruised but resilient network, U.S. intelligence chief John Negroponte said on Thursday.
In an unusually direct statement on the whereabouts of the militant group's top echelon, Negroponte told the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence that Pakistan is the center of a web of al Qaeda connections that stretches across the globe into Europe.
"Al Qaeda is the terrorist organization that poses the greatest threat to U.S. interests," the U.S. director of national intelligence said in his annual assessment of worldwide threats against the United States and its interests.
"They are cultivating stronger operational connections and relationships that radiate outward from their leaders' secure hide-out in Pakistan to affiliates throughout the Middle East, North Africa and Europe," he said.
It appeared to be the first time in congressional testimony that Negroponte has singled out Pakistan as the locale for the headquarters of the network. It is accused of the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington that killed about 3,000 people in 2001.
Up to now, U.S. officials have said that al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and his second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahri are hiding somewhere along the rugged mountainous border between Pakistan and Afghanistan.
'CORE ELEMENTS ARE RESILIENT'
Negroponte did not cite bin Laden or Zawahri by name and did not say where in Pakistan U.S. intelligence believes al Qaeda leaders are hiding.
Negroponte, who became U.S. intelligence chief in April 2005 and will soon leave to become deputy secretary of state, told the same panel a year ago that al Qaeda's leadership posed a threat to the United States from bases in the Pakistan-Afghanistan border area.
"We have captured or killed numerous senior al Qaeda operatives, but al Qaeda's core elements are resilient. They continue to plot attacks against our homeland and other targets with the objective of inflicting mass casualties," he said on Thursday.
U.S. officials have long complained about Islamist militant activity in Pakistan, which has been blamed as a source of increasing Taliban and al Qaeda attacks in neighboring Afghanistan.
"Pakistan is our partner in the war on terror and has captured several al Qaeda leaders. However, it is also a major source of Islamic extremism," Negroponte said in written testimony submitted to the panel.
"Eliminating the safe haven that the Taliban and other extremists have found in Pakistan's tribal areas is not sufficient to end the insurgency in Afghanistan but it is necessary."
He noted the political problems facing Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf due to a potential for tribal rebellion and a backlash by Islamic political parties opposed to the U.S. military presence in Afghanistan and Iraq.
"With elections expected later this year, the situation will become even more challenging for President Musharraf and for the U.S.," Negroponte said.
National Intelligence Director John Negroponte (L) and Federal Bureau of Investigation Director Robert Mueller talk before the Senate Intelligence Committee hearing regarding 'The Annual Threat Assessment' on Capitol Hill in Washington January 11, 2007. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)
Hey John, Did ya hear the latest one about Obama?
What does the United States of America stand to benefit from Negroponte making statements such as this?
Thanks, Norm.
We pay folks big bucks to be so knowledgeable. /s
Al Queda is our enemy = See Jane run.
Why is their secure hideout still standing if we know where it is?
That secure hideout and those AQ leaders in Pakistan are FAR more important than a democracy in Iraq will ever be.
That Pakistan hasn't moved on it tells you all you need to about just how reliable an ally they are. For example, take a real ally like the UK or Israel or Australia. If AQ had a secure hideout with their leadership in Leeds do you thik it'd still be there, untouched? If it was in the Australian outback? In the Negev? Of course not. Pakistan is a joke.
The fact that we haven't moved on it is inexcusable. The President's comments about the war on terror and Iranb and Syria and "no distinction between those that harbor terrorists" kind of rings hollow after reading this.
Pakistan is harboring AQ's senior leadership in a secure compund accoring to your own DNI, Mr. President. What are you going to do?
The UK and the rest of our 'allies'. Aren't a Muslim Nation that their 'leader' controls by a thread.
"The UK and the rest of our 'allies'. Aren't a Muslim Nation that their 'leader' controls by a thread."
The UK and the rest of our 'allies' aren't a NUCLEAR Muslim Nation that their 'leader' controls by a thread.
Probably in Waziristan, which the central government in Islamabad has never been able to control. That's teh area over by the Afghn border.
We should go in there, but discreetly. We don't want to give the military an excuse to topple Musharraf.
I stand by my tag...
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