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New light is being shed on the 2001 anthrax attacks in a fascinating open letter to Ayman al Zawahiri of al Qaeda, written by a jihadi living in London. Numan Bin Uthman, a former leader of an armed Islamic group in Libya, provides yet more evidence that the global Islamic jihad movement is losing its resolve.  But the letter contains a startling admission. Uthman tells us of a conversation he had with al Qaeda leaders before the 9/11 attacks in which he urged them not to use WMD. From AKI News: Uthman also said that he had taken part in...

Excerpt: Use of poisons U.S. intelligence officials believe that Marri trained for two years in Afghanistan, among other things receiving instruction in the use of poisons and toxins at the Derunta camp near Jalalabad, sources said. He is believed to have trained under Abu Khabab al-Masri, an Egyptian specialist in chemical and biological weapons who was killed ... *** U.S. authorities allege that Marri had gone to the United Arab Emirates in August 2001 to get more than $13,000 in cash from Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi, the alleged paymaster for the Sept. 11 plotters. *** The Islamic Assembly of North America,...

Al-qaida military chief killed, taliban confirms The military chief of Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network was killed along with seven colleagues in a US bombing raid three days ago, a Taliban official has confirmed. Mullah Najibullah, a Taliban official in the south-east Afghan border town of Spinboldak, confirmed Atef's death but would not identify the location of the airstrike or the other al-Qaida members who died with him. It was the first time a senior Taliban official has confirmed Friday's claim by US officials that Atef was killed in an airstrike outside Kabul. Atef's death is seen as a ...

A look at suspected al-Qaida operatives U.S. officials believe may be part of a plot to attack America: _ADNAN G. EL SHUKRIJUMAH: A Saudi native who used to live in South Florida. Nicknamed "Jafar the Pilot," El Shukrijumah is believed to be a possible leader of a terrorism cell or organizer similar to Mohamed Atta. He was a top planner of the Sept. 11 attacks and piloted one of the hijacked planes. FBI officials began searching for El Shukrijumah last year due in part to the overseas interrogation of captured al-Qaida senior planner Khalid Shaikh Mohammed. Federal prosecutors in northern...

The September11 terror attacks in the US were staged to overcome disunity in al-Qa'ida, confidential computer records reveal. Alan Cullison reports on what happened after his laptop was wrecked while he was covering the combat in Afghanistan IN the autumn of 2001, I was one of scores of journalists who ventured into northern Afghanistan to write about the US-assisted war against the Taliban. After losing use of my computer in an accident, I scrawled stories by candlelight with a ballpoint pen and read dispatches to my editors at The Wall Street Journal over a satellite phone. When the Taliban's defences...

DAKAR, Senegal (AP) - A series of witnesses place six top al-Qaida fugitives in Africa buying up diamonds in the run-up to the Sept. 11 attacks, according to a confidential report by UN-backed prosecutors obtained by The Associated Press. The first-person accounts detailed by the prosecutors add to long-standing claims that al-Qaida laundered millions of dollars in terror funds through African diamonds before launching its deadliest offensive. Al-Qaida figures, including some already wanted in pre-Sept. 11 attacks on U.S. targets, dealt directly with then-president Charles Taylor and other leaders and warlords in the West African country of Liberia from 1999...

Dubai - An Islamic website on Sunday carried a statement attributed to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda terror network claiming responsibility for a plane crash in Kenya that left 12 Americans and two South Africans dead. The statement, the authenticity of which could not be verified, said the plane was hit "head on" with a ground-to-air SAM-7 missile. It was apparently fired by followers of Mohammed Atef, the Egyptian national suspected of being Bin Laden's number two. The statement said three CIA agents were on board the plane searching for Mujahedeen positions on the Kenyan border. It also promised the...

A SEBEGALESE Muslim cleric deported from Italy as a danger to state security was quoted today as telling a pan-Arab newspaper that he had met three times with Osama bin Laden, leader of the al-Qaeda terrorist network. The cleric, Abdel Qadir Mamour, told the London-based Asharq Al-Awsat in an interview by telephone from Dakar, Senegal, that he had the meetings with bin Laden in Sudan from 1993 to 1996. Mamour said bin Laden had provided money to finance his trading in diamonds between Africa and Belgium, but did not say how much money was involved or if bin Laden was...

NAJAF, Iraq - Iraqi police have arrested four al-Qaida-linked suspects in the bombing of Iraq's holiest Shiite Muslim shrine, a senior police official told The Associated Press on Saturday. The official, who said the explosion death toll had risen to 107, said the men - two Iraqis and two Saudis - were caught shortly after Friday's car bombing. The attack killed one of the most important Shiite clerics in Iraq, Ayatollah Mohammed Baqir al-Hakim, who had been cooperating with the American occupation force. On Saturday, 4,000 mourners chanted for vengeance in Najaf. In Baghdad, about 3,000 Shiites protested peacefully for...

Not for commercial use. Solely to be used for the educational purposes of research and open discussion. Report: Suspect's Passport Found Associated Press Online INTERNATIONAL NEWS August 17, 2002 Saturday 11:59 AM Eastern Time BERLIN The passport of a Syrian-born man suspected of recruiting some of the Hamburg-based Sept. 11 hijackers was found at the house of a top al-Qaida official in Afghanistan, according to a report Saturday. Zammar was in Hamburg with hijackers Mohamed Atta, Marwan al-Shehhi and Ziad Jarrah. The German passport of Mohammed Haydar Zammar was found in the ruins of the home of Mohammed Atef, bin...