Worldwide manhunt underway for Midhat Mursi
US Intelligence agencies have launched a worldwide manhunt for Al-Qaeda’s master bomb maker, who, they contend, may be building a "dirty" bomb and other new devices for terror attacks inside the United States. US counter-terrorism officials were quoted by the New York Post as saying that it was new information about the activities of Egyptian-born bomb maker Midhat Mursi, in part, that led the Bush administration to secretly dispatch Department of Energy radiological detection teams to New York and four other cities at New Year’s eve. Before the Bush administration decided to raise the nationwide alert level to Code Orange, an Al-Qaeda informant had said that Mursi, who goes by the nom de guerre Abu Khabab, was active again, intelligence officials told The Post.
Khabab is Zawahiri's resident mad scientist, seen working with Zarqawi in the Pankisi Gorge, training bad guys in how to dish out ricin.
Intelligence officials said Mursi is a chemical engineer who was head of Al-Qaeda’s weapons-of-mass-destruction committee and reported directly to Al-Qaeda’s number- two, Ayman al-Zawahiri. He is believed to have gone underground before or during the 2001 Afghanistan war and is considered the most wanted Al-Qaeda figure after Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri.
If I was keeping the list, I'd put Zarqawi a step ahead of him, but go on...
Before the Afghan war, Mursi operated crude laboratories at an Al-Qaeda complex near Jalalabad, where satellite imagery showed scores of dead animals outside, victims of ghoulish experiments with anthrax and other biological and chemical poisons, US officials were quoted as saying. The Post quoted unidentified sources as saying documents found at the camp and at Al-Qaeda safe houses in Afghanistan and Pakistan also included, what one intelligence official called, "very innovative designs for explosive devices" — some designed to be carried aboard airplanes without being detected. Some documents, it said, indicated Mursi was exchanging information with Palestinian and Hezbollah bomb makers — including some who helped design the shoe bomb carried aboard a Paris-to-Boston flight by Richard Reid in 2001, sources said. Reid was overpowered before be could ignite the bomb.
Building a dirty bomb is far easier, and the terrorist network's attempts to do so have been documented through evidence uncovered in Afghanistan (news - web sites) and elsewhere. Three men identified as Al Qaeda's weapons of mass destruction committee would likely plan the attack, said two European intelligence officials and independent experts. The committee leader is Midhat Mursi, an Egyptian chemical engineer also known as Abu Khabab. Officials said he is regarded as Al Qaeda's master bomb builder and is one of the group's most-wanted fugitives — although there have been unconfirmed reports that Mursi is in U.S. custody. LINK
Yes, it was Midhat Mursi.
Here's another older article (1/18/2004)