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High-tech snooping for bin Laden

WASHINGTON (CNN) --U.S. forces searching for al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden along the mountainous border between Pakistan and Afghanistan will soon implement high-tech surveillance tactics in the region, enabling them to monitor the area 24 hours a day, seven days a week, CNN has learned.

It's believed that the constant surveillance of the border region and the "squeeze play" by U.S. and Pakistani forces surrounding the mountainous frontier will present the best chance ever to net the world's most-wanted terrorist, who has eluded capture since U.S. troops launched a search for him in late 2001.

Top administration officials believe bin Laden may begin to feel the heat from the troops now hunting him and might start to move.

"We are putting the pieces in place to throw the net over him," one official told CNN.

Among the devices that will be in place within days are U-2 spy planes flying at 70,000 feet, taking pictures, using radar and intercepting communications.

Unmanned Predator drones, flying closer at 25,000 feet, are equipped with cameras that can spot vehicles and people and special radar that can operate through clouds. Some of the Predators may also carry Hellfire missiles.

Ground sensors may also be placed along mountain passes to listen for vehicles.

Data from the planes and sensors will be sent via satellite to analysts for quick action. The U.S. military has bought up satellite transmission capacity in the region, to ensure it can respond quickly.

But none of the measures are being acknowledged officially.

"Of course you've heard and seen in the press that Osama bin Laden is surrounded, we have him cornered and we know where he is, etc., etc. And of course, we don't know that," said Gen. John Abizaid, commander of the U.S. Central Command, in an interview with PBS' Jim Lehrer.

Abizaid added that there are no U.S. troops on Pakistani soil, and said U.S. efforts with the Pakistanis are focused on cooperation and coordination.

When asked if he thought bin Laden would be captured this year, the general said he had no way of knowing.

But, he said, "I think that we will make it very painful for al Qaeda between now and the end of the year."

CNN Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr contributed to this report.

http://cnn.worldnews.printthis.clickability.com/pt/cpt?action=cpt&title=CNN.com+-+High-tech+snooping+for+bin+Laden+-+Mar.+4%2C+2004&expire=-1&urlID=9499797&fb=Y&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cnn.com%2F2004%2FWORLD%2Fasiapcf%2F03%2F04%2Fbinladen.search%2Findex.html&partnerID=2006

Russian Engineers Reportedly Gave Missile Aid to Iraq
By JAMES RISEN

Published: March 5, 2004

WASHINGTON, March 4 — A group of Russian engineers secretly aided Saddam Hussein's long-range ballistic missile program, providing technical assistance for prohibited Iraqi weapons projects even in the years just before the war that ousted him from power, American government officials say.

Iraqis who were involved in the missile work told American investigators that the technicians had not been working for the Russian government, but for a private company. But any such work on Iraq's banned missiles would have violated United Nations sanctions, even as the Security Council sought to enforce them.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/05/politics/05MISS.html?th

Nigerian army 'offered nukes'
From correspondents in Abuja
March 04, 2004

PAKISTAN'S top general has offered to help Nigeria to "strengthen its military capability and acquire nuclear power", a Nigerian defence ministry statement said Thursday.

The offer was made Wednesday when the chairman of Pakistan's joint chiefs of staff, General Muhammad Aziz Khan, met with Nigeria's Defence Minister Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso in Abuja, the statement said.

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,8868660%255E1702,00.html

Report: Bin Laden escaped dragnet

TORA BORA, Afghanistan, March 5 (UPI) -- Reports have been received in eastern Afghanistan that al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden dodged a Pakistani raid to capture him, the BBC said Friday.

A local official told the BBC the information came in a fax sent to a former Taliban member three days ago.

The official, who did not want to be named, said he met a former member of the Taliban who had received a fax that said "the Sheikh" -- bin Laden's nickname -- was alive and well and had escaped an attempt by Pakistani forces to catch him on their side of the border last week in the tribal areas of South Waziristan.

http://washingtontimes.com/upi-breaking/20040305-090123-6619r.htm

Documentary on life with bin Laden
Friday, March 5, 2004 Posted: 6:42 PM EST (2342 GMT)

Osama bin Laden

TORONTO (AP) -- Osama bin Laden likes poetry and volleyball, had squabbles with his children, and banned any American conveniences like ice and soft drinks, according to a Canadian TV documentary on a family that had close ties to the al Qaeda leader until 2001.

The program showed a softer side of the world's No. 1 fugitive, but it also reflected his fundamentalist Islamic attitudes toward women and his terrorist war against the United States.

The show's main interview subject, Abdurahman Khadr, said he was captured in Afghanistan and worked for a time with the CIA, FBI and the U.S. military. Khadr said his father, Ahmed Said, dragged the whole family into the world of al Qaeda by moving them into bin Laden's compound.

http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/03/05/binladen.canadian.ap/index.html