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Chart: Al-Qa`ida's WMD Activities
By Weapons of Mass Destruction Terrorism Research Program (WMDTRP)*

Updated: May 13, 2005

The following table provides a comprehensive listing of reports concerning al-Qa`ida's involvement with chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear weapons between 1997 and 2004. The information about al-Qa`ida's WMD activities derives from a wide array of sources whose reliability is quite variable. Among those sources are the public pronouncements of al-Qa`ida leaders, the testimony of imprisoned al-Qa`ida members, statements by public officials from numerous governments, leaks from unnamed intelligence sources, claims made by more or less dubious individuals, uncorroborated and often biased journalistic accounts, and - most reliably - captured al-Qa`ida documents (including videotapes) or tangible physical evidence in the form of abandoned al-Qa`ida safe houses and laboratory facilities. The difficulties inherent in properly evaluating these diverse sources are partially acknowledged in the table itself, since we have tried to identify uncorroborated incidents by labeling them as "alleged", "reported", "purported", etc. For additional information regarding these matters, please feel free to contact the authors.

http://cns.miis.edu/pubs/other/sjm_cht.htm