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ABC News is reporting that Current and former CIA officers speaking to ABC News on the condition of confidentiality say the United States scrambled to get all the suspects off European soil before Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrived there today. The officers say 11 top al Qaeda suspects have now been moved to a new CIA facility in the North African desert. The disgrunted intelligence officers even disclosed an actual list of 12 high-value targets allegedly held by the CIA, and ABC is reporting it : Abu Zubaydah: Held first in Thailand then Poland Ibn Al-Shaykh al-Libi: Held in...

The terrorist courier with a CD-ROM containing a 17-page document and with other messages was Hassan Ghul, who confessed he was taking to Al Qaeda the Ansar document setting forth a strategy to start an Iraqi civil war, along with a plea for reinforcements. The Kurds turned him over to Americans for further interrogation, which is proving fruitful. The New York Times reporter Dexter Filkins in Baghdad, backed up by Douglas Jehl in Washington, broke the story exclusively (IHT, Feb. 10). Editors marked its significance by placing it on the front page above the fold. Although The Washington Post the...

In the town of Kalar, about a hundred miles northeast of Baghdad, Kurdish villagers recently reported suspicious activity to the pesh merga. That Kurdish militia has for years been waging a bloody battle with Ansar al-Islam, the terrorist group affiliated with Al Qaeda in Afghanistan and supported by Saddam Hussein in Iraq. It captured a courier carrying a message that demolishes the repeated claim of Bush critics that there was never a "clear link" between Saddam and Osama bin Laden. The terrorist courier with a CD-ROM containing a 17-page document and other messages was Hassan Ghul, who confessed he was...

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A militant Islamist linked to the al Qaeda network has plotted a series of attacks in Iraq aimed at provoking sectarian violence and a civil war, the U.S.-led occupation authority said Monday. Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, top U.S. military spokesman in Iraq, said U.S. forces had seized a letter outlining the plan which they attribute to Abu Musab Zarqawi, whom Washington suspects in the killing of a U.S. diplomat in Jordan in 2002 and of links to Ansar al-Islam, a militant group operating in Iraq. "We believe the document is credible and we take the threat seriously,"...

<p>BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - An anti-American operative in Iraq appealed for help from al-Qaida leaders to help spark a sectarian war between Shiite and Sunni Muslims in an effort to ``tear the country apart,'' U.S. officials said Monday.</p> <p>The officials confirmed a report Monday in The New York Times about the alleged plan, which was outlined in a 17-page letter that U.S. forces confiscated from an al-Qaida suspect in Iraq.</p>

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Feb. 8 — American officials here have obtained a detailed proposal that they conclude was written by an operative in Iraq to senior leaders of Al Qaeda, asking for help to wage a "sectarian war" in Iraq in the next months. The Americans say they believe that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian who has long been under scrutiny by the United States for suspected ties to Al Qaeda, wrote the undated 17-page document. Mr. Zarqawi is believed to be operating here in Iraq. The document was made available to The New York Times on Sunday, with an accompanying...

WASHINGTON (AP) - U.S. officials say they have mounting evidence to suggest al-Qaida operative Abu Musab Zarqawi has had a hand in multiple attacks in Iraq, including those on a mosque in Najaf, the U.N. headquarters in Baghdad and Italy's paramilitary police station in Nasiriyah. Another al-Qaida member, Hassan Ghul, was arrested this month while entering northern Iraq and is believed to have met with Zarqawi to plan attacks against U.S. and coalition forces, said a U.S. official, speaking on the condition of anonymity.Now in U.S. custody, Ghul is believed to be cooperating with interrogators. He known as a facilitator...

Last week's capture of Hassan Ghul along the Iran- Iraq border proves al Qaeda terrorists actively are seeking a foothold in Iraq "to continue their murderous campaigns," the commander of Combined Joint Task Force 7 said in Baghdad today. "For months I've been saying that al Qaeda's fingerprints have been here in Iraq," Army Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez told reporters during a briefing. "Those (fingerprints) are showing themselves in the techniques that were being employed by foreign fighters, and this included the tactics being employed by suicide bombers against innocent Iraqis and against coalition forces." In al Qaeda's chain of...

BAGHDAD, Iraq - The minister in charge of Iraqi police said Monday that al-Qaida was probably behind some suicide bombings in Iraq (news - web sites), and President Bush (news - web sites) praised the capture of a senior member of Osama bin Laden (news - web sites)'s network. "There is a presence of al-Qaida in this country. We've announced that directly and indirectly," Interior Minister Nouri Badran said. "A lot of the suicide attacks have the fingerprints of the crimes committed by al-Qaida," he added. Asked if al-Qaida is operating in Iraq, he said: "Yes, it is." But he...

An al Qaeda operative with close ties to the suspected mastermind of the September 11, 2001, attacks has been captured in Iraq. US president George W Bush said Hassan Ghul was helping al Qaeda step up attacks by insurgents against soldiers in Iraq. He was captured last week. Al Qaeda members are believed to have entered Iraq after the war last year that toppled President Saddam Hussein. Mr Bush said Ghul "reported directly" to Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who is suspected of coordinating the September 11 attacks on the United States that killed about 3,000 people and who was captured in...