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MIAMI – A suspected al-Qaida operative who lived for more than 15 years in the U.S. has become chief of the terror network's global operations, the FBI says, marking the first time a leader so intimately familiar with American society has been placed in charge of planning attacks. Adnan Shukrijumah, 35, has taken over a position once held by 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Miami-based FBI counterterrorism agent Brian LeBlanc (said). That puts him in regular contact with al-Qaida's senior leadership, including Osama bin Laden... Shukrijumah and two others were part of an "external operations council" that designed and approved...

Attacks on nuclear power stations, oil and gas terminals, Canary Wharf and Heathrow’s control tower were being considered by leaders of the plot to blow up seven transatlantic airliners in mid-flight, a court was told yesterday. Documents found on computer memory sticks at the home of an alleged terrorist ringleader contained a list of targets across Britain – including the gas pipeline between Britain and Belgium. The man, Assad Sarwar, was said to be in contact with terrorist leaders overseas and visited Pakistan a month before his arrest as preparations for the airline attacks were being finalised. Peter Wright, QC,...

SNIPPET: "U.S. counterterrorism officials have linked one of the nation's most wanted terrorists to last year's thwarted plot to bomb the New York City subway system, authorities said Wednesday. Current and former counterterrorism officials said top al-Qaida operative Adnan Shukrijumah met with one of the would-be suicide bombers in a plot that Attorney General Eric Holder called one of the most dangerous since the 9/11 terror attacks."

BULLETIN -- NEW YORK POLICE AND FBI RAID HOMES IN QUEENS IN TERRORISM INVESTIGATION.6 minutes ago from BNO Headquarters

SNIPPET: "TERROR mastermind Rashid Rauf has been linked to a fresh Al Qaida plot to launch attacks on the US. The Birmingham-born extremist has been named by witnesses due to testify against Najibullah Zazi, who was arrested for plotting suicide bombings in New York. MI6 officers have linked the plot to a complex terror network said to be directed from Pakistan by Rauf and fellow jihadists. Zazi, 24, was identified through an intercepted communication, and was further implicated by US national Bryant Neal Vinas, who was captured in Pakistan last November. Vinas, 26, allegedly admits meeting Rauf and receiving training...

The War: The killing of al-Qaida's 2006 airline bomb plot planner by an American Predator drone is only the latest terror-war victory. From Anbar to Waziristan, they're dropping like flies.Rashid Rauf, mastermind of the 2006 trans-Atlantic airline bomb plot, became the latest al-Qaida casualty when a missile launched from a Predator drone struck a tribesman's house in the village of Alikhel in North Waziristan. If Rauf believed he had found sanctuary there, he was sadly mistaken. There have been at least 20 such strikes in the last three months as the Bush administration seeks to thwart the ability of militants...

Al Qaeda Bag of Shit, Rashid Rauf, heads off to see the virgins Gotta love Hellfire packin' Predators. More . . .

A fugitive British militant linked to an alleged UK plot to use liquid bombs to blow up transatlantic airliners has been killed in Pakistan, reports say. Pakistani media said Rashid Rauf, born in Birmingham, was killed in a US air strike in North Waziristan, a haven for militants and the Taleban. Mr Rauf, on the run after escaping from a Pakistani jail, was alleged to have helped the group planning the attacks. Three men were convicted in the UK in September of conspiracy to murder. News of the liquid bomb plot paralysed global air travel, prompting authorities to implement stringent...

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - A man who was arrested in Pakistan last year on suspicion of plotting to blow up trans-Atlantic airplanes and who faced extradition to Britain in another case, escaped from his guards Saturday after a court hearing here, officials said Sunday.The suspect, Rashid Rauf, 26, apparently slipped out of his handcuffs and darted away just after the afternoon extradition hearing, said Muhammad Arshad, the station officer at the local Margalla police station. Two of the policemen guarding him were arrested in the incident, he said, but he added that he did not think they had helped Mr....

  Rashid Rauf British terrorist suspect escapes in Pakistan 1 hour agoISLAMABAD (AFP) — A British man suspected of plotting to blow up US-bound trans-Atlantic airliners has escaped from police custody in Pakistan, officials said early Sunday."Rashid Rauf escaped from police custody and we are making every possible effort to re-arrest him," interior ministry spokesman Brigadier Javed Cheema told AFP.Rauf was arrested in central Pakistan in August 2006 and had been behind bars since then.The twenty-five-year-old was brought before a judge at a court in Islamabad for an extradition hearing when he escaped Saturday afternoon.The police chief of Islamabad,...

Rashid Rauf, a British suspect in an alleged plot to blow up trans-Atlantic jetliners, escaped from police custody in Pakistan on Saturday, officials said. Rauf escaped after appearing before a judge at a court in the capital, Islamabad, said Khalid Pervez, a city police official. Pervez said Rauf managed to open his handcuffs and evade two police guards who were taking him back to jail in the nearby city of Rawalpindi. "We do not know how he escaped. But we do know he has escaped and the two policemen have been taken into custody for negligence," Pervez told The Associated...

Islamabad, Feb 2 (DPA) Pakistan has told Britain that the alleged mastermind of thwarted bombings of transatlantic flights cannot be extradited until his trial in local courts concludes, news reports said on Friday. Pakistani authorities earlier clarified their position to a British delegation that was in Islamabad to finalize an agreement on a joint working group to enhance cooperation against terrorism and organized crimes, the Dawn newspaper reported. 'Rashid Rauf is also an accused in a case being tried in Pakistan, and according to the law of the country, he cannot be handed over to the UK unless the...

Police are trying to trace a gang of British Muslims who are thought to have returned to plot terror attacks in Britain after being trained abroad for more than a year by al-Qaeda, Nine Britons, all said to be in their twenties, were among a group of 12 Western recruits groomed by al-Qaeda at a secret camp near the Afghan border to set up new terror cells in London and other Western capitals. Police do not know the real identities of this gang, who are known as the “English brothers” because of their shared language. As well as nine Britons,...

Excerpt - ISLAMABAD (AFP) - A Pakistani court has dropped terrorism charges against a British man suspected of being a key figure in an alleged plot to blow up transatlantic airliners. Rashid Rauf, 25, was arrested in central Pakistan in early August. Pakistani officials said that his detention led to the uncovering of the conspiracy and that he was linked to Al-Qaeda. ~ snip ~

Three months after the RCMP began arresting 18 suspects accused of plotting terror attacks in Canada, an investigation by the National Post has uncovered a web of links to Pakistan. Today, in the first of four parts, the role of a Pakistani training camp is revealed.- - - BALAKOT, Pakistan - A worn footpath climbs from the Kaghan Valley highway into the lush mountains above the River Kunar, on Kashmir's western frontier. The locals all know where it leads. An hour's walk up the steep trail there is a training camp built by Islamic militants called Madrassa Syed Ahmed Shaheed...

LONDON, Aug 24: British police investigating a suspected plot to blow up transatlantic airliners freed two suspects on Wednesday and obtained permission to continue questioning nine others. Police had charged 11 people on Tuesday in the suspected plot and had been holding 11 others pending a decision on whether to charge them. They did not name the men they freed on Wednesday, but Sky News reported that one was Tayib Rauf of Birmingham, Britain’s second city. His brother Rashid Rauf has been arrested in Pakistan. Police later said they had obtained a judge’s permission to continue questioning eight of the...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - ABC News reported on Friday that Pakistani officials have arrested a top al Qaeda commander and that he could provide clues on the whereabouts of Islamic militant cells worldwide and Osama bin Laden. The television network said Pakistani police arrested Matiur Rehman based on leads in the investigation of a foiled plot to bomb U.S.-bound airplanes from London. U.S. law enforcement officials have been notified by the Pakistanis that Rehman is in custody, according to ABC. No independent confirmation of the report was immediately available. U.S. intelligence officials say they cannot confirm his arrest and remain skeptical...

Islamabad - Pakistan has informed US-led coalition forces that an al-Qaeda kingpin linked to an alleged plot to blow up airliners is based in eastern Afghanistan, security officials said on Friday. The senior Pakistani officials said the unnamed al-Qaeda member was based in Afghanistan's volatile eastern province of Kunar, which borders Pakistan's militant-infested north-western tribal areas. The information came from the interrogation of Rashid Rauf, a Briton whose arrest by Pakistani agents in early August allegedly led to the uncovering of the conspiracy to bomb US-bound planes, they said. The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, did not identify the...

Excerpt - The arrest in Pakistan of up to three British men allegedly caught meeting local militants was on Friday night being heralded as the key breakthrough that helped foil a suspected terrorist plot to blow up US-bound aircraft, according to Pakistani intelligence officials. One of those arrested, Rashid Rauf, was last night named by Pakistan’s interior minister as a “key person”. Aftab Khan Sherpao told AP Mr Rauf had ties with al-Qaeda and added: “We arrested him from the border area and on his disclosure we shared the information with British authorities which led to further arrests in Britain.”...

Five of the suspected London terrorists are still at large and are being urgently hunted, according to U.S. sources who have been briefed on the airplane bombing plot. Officials tell ABC News 24 people now have been taken into custody. Twenty-two are believed to be of Pakistani descent. One is Bangladeshi, and another is of Iranian descent, according to the officials. One of the arrests was made in the northeastern London suburb of Walthamstow. Residents said police took away a man in his late 20s at 2 a.m. today. The neighbors said the man was British-born, with one parent who...