Pakistan says al-Qaida link to plot found ... number three identified as main planner

The Guardian (UK) ^ | August 17, 2006 | by Duncan Campbell in Islamabad

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Pakistani security sources said yesterday that al-Qaida's "number three" was behind the alleged plot to blow up several transatlantic flights leaving the UK.

They also suggested Britain wanted to allow the plotters to try a dry run, without explosives, so as to gather more evidence, but was persuaded to intervene earlier by US and Pakistani authorities.

British detectives are in Islamabad working with the Pakistani security services with regard to Rashid Rauf, the Briton held in connection with the alleged plot. No decision has been made as to whether he will be extradited to Britain.

Abu Faraj al-Libbi, who after Osama bin Laden and the Egyptian-born Ayman al-Zawahiri, is suspected of being al-Qaida's third in command, has been named by Pakistani security sources as the main planner of the alleged plot, according to Dawn, a daily newspaper. He has also been accused of being in a plot to assassinate Pakistan's president, Pervez Musharraf, and was arrested last year and turned over to the US.

A security official said: "There was a mastermind, there was a planner, and there were the executioners." He claimed the al-Qaida link to the alleged plot in Britain had been established and that it had been at the planning stage when it was interrupted in London last week.

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cross linking

Reuters popped this one up tonight on their wire also..

ABC News says Pakistanis arrest al Qaeda commander
Reuters on Yahoo ^ | 8/18/06 | Reuters
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