Report: Al-Qaeda No. 2 Visited Bulgaria

Al Qaeda's second in command, Ayman al-Zawahiri, travelled to Bulgaria among other countries on Islamic Jihad business and under an assumed name, Birmingham Post-Herald claims.

According to the article Zawahiri visited Switzerland, Bosnia, Bulgaria and Dagestan, a Russian province and even made surreptitious fund-raising swings through Texas, California and New York in the 1990s.

In a separate development Ayman al-Zawahiri biographer, Pakistani journalist Hamid Mir, announced that Zawahiri, visited New Zealand and Australia in 1996 to recruit militants.

In those days, in early 1996, he was on a mission to organise his network all over the world, Mir said.

The claims come as Pakistani officials said the previous day they might have cornered al-Zawahiri in a remote area near the Afghan border after two days of intense fighting.

On Saturday Pakistan's military arrested more than 100 suspects in a five-day assault on militants holed up in mud fortresses along the border where al-Qaeda No. 2 Ayman al Zawahri is believed trapped.

FULL Text of Birmingham Post-Herald Article READ TODAY in For the Record Section @ http://www.novinite.com/view_news.php?id=32445

May I ask why those in charge of immigration visa programs at the time this man was visiting the USA (Clinton era) are not being hauled before congress? The 9/11 review panel? The thing that most disgust me about my country is that there is either cover your ass corruption at best and sinister ops corruption at worse - and no one exposes a thing (or else?).

Bush did fail in one thing - he failed to clean house of Clinton hold overs who perpetuated Clintonian policies - like those found in the Balkans. If Bush loses that will be his undoing. Why did Bush continue Clinton policies toward Iraq, al-Qaeda, Balkans?? It is understandable to maintain the status quo whenyou first take office but to not fire ANYONE over 9/11? Over the fiasco in Kosovo? And to wait till those you could have fired to leave office and call you a fool? Sorry Bush - as a CEO and grad from Yale Business school you should have known that CEO's can and do fire people all the time.

Bulgaria has a huge "dissafected" Turko-Muslim population by the way:

Greek Train Bomb plot thwarted: 5 propane rail cars crossing Bulgarian border were rigged to explode

Al-Qaeda "Recruits Bulgarian Students"

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told The Associated Press that intelligence reports on the meeting in Sofia, the Bulgarian capital, prompted a special government session Thursday night to discuss threats against the U.S. Embassy and embassies of European countries. He did not name the countries. At the Sofia meeting, members of al-Qaida decided that "in Sarajevo something will happen to Americans similar to New York last September," said the official. He did not say when the al-Qaida meeting was held or who attended.

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