International
Masood murder: Al-Qaeda hand `confirmed'
LONDON, JAN. 1. Two computers apparently used by Osama bin Laden's top lieutenants have been recovered in Kabul, providing stunning evidence of the complexity and ambition of the Al-Qaeda group believed to be responsible for the September 11 attacks in the U.S.
According to reports here, a journalist bought the desktop and laptop computer that, among other things, confirmed that the Al-Qaeda group was responsible for the murder of Ahmad Shah Masood, the leader of the Northern Alliance, shortly before the September 11 attacks.
Masood was assassinated when two men posing as TV journalists detonated a bomb hidden in a camera while pretending to interview him. The computer hard drives, bought by the correspondent of Wall Street Journal, contain the original of a letter requesting the interview. Among hundreds of files recovered from the computer by the newspaper are detailed discussions of the development of chemical and biological weapons under the heading of operation Al-Zabadi, the Arabic word for curdled milk.
In one memo, apparently written by Ayman Zawahari, Osama's chief strategist, he says ``the destructive power of these weapons is no less than that of nuclear weapons''. But in a bitter irony for America it adds that ``we only became aware of them when the enemy drew our attention to them by repeatedly expressing concern that they can be produced simply.''
Many of the documents refer to Al-Qaeda as ``the corporation'' and its chief officers as ``the general management'', a report in Daily Telegraph here said today. The journal said its reporter bought the computers from a shop that had bought them from a looter. He had apparently taken them from a building used by Al-Qaeda leaders in Kabul that was destroyed by American bombing. According to the report, the hard drives contain large numbers of documents written to and by members of the network's cells in Europe, West Asia and elsewhere around the world. - PTI
Mission to nab Omar
AP reports from Kabul:
Pushing to snatch the elusive leader of Afghanistan's deposed Taliban, Mullah Omar, American forces have launched a mission to capture him, probably from the mountains north-west of his Islamic movement's one-time stronghold, Afghanistan's interim Prime Minister said.
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