OT: Top al Qaeda Operative Arrested

[Guest guest]

Thursday, November 21, 2002 Posted: 5:47 PM EST (2247 GMT)

 

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Al Qaeda's chief of operations in the Persian Gulf

is in U.S. custody after his recent capture in an undisclosed country,

U.S. officials said Thursday.

 

Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, the suspected mastermind behind the October

2000 bombing of the USS Cole that killed 17 sailors, was arrested

earlier this month, officials said. He is considered one of the highest

ranking al Qaeda leaders captured in the international war on terrorism.

 

He is of similar rank to two other captured al Qaeda operatives --

operations chief Abu Zubaydah and Ramzi Binalshibh, a main organizer of

the September 11 attacks.

 

Few details were revealed about al-Nashiri's capture or where he is

being held.

 

One U.S. official told CNN he was captured " in the region for which he

was responsible, " but would not elaborate. Intelligence officials said

al-Nashiri was running his reputed operations out of Yemen, but they

would not say if that is where he was nabbed.

 

Al-Nashiri has been cooperating with interrogators since his

apprehension, another U.S. official said. " He has been of some help in

terms of information, " the U.S. official said, declining to be more

specific.

 

In recent weeks, U.S. and coalition officials have warned of a growing

terrorist threat, based on a recent audiotape message by Osama bin Laden

and information from key detainees captured in the war on terror.

 

The U.S. State Department issued a " worldwide caution Wednesday " warning

Americans of continued threats posed by terrorists against U.S.

interests.

 

U.S. government sources said Thursday there had been persistent

intelligence reports over the past several weeks of possible maritime

attacks in the Red Sea -- including plans to fly airplanes into U.S. and

coalition warships in the region. Officials described the reports as

" credible " but " uncorroborated, " but said they were taking all the

reports seriously.

 

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(Full story)

 

Sources: Warships Targeted by al Qaeda

 

>From Barbara Starr

CNN Washington Bureau

Thursday, November 21, 2002 Posted: 5:54 PM EST (2254 GMT)

 

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Intelligence reports gathered over the past several

weeks point to possible maritime attacks in the Red Sea -- including

plans to fly airplanes into U.S. and coalition warships, U.S. government

sources told CNN on Thursday.

 

The reports, sources said, were a key reason the U.S. wanted to keep

secret the fact it had top al Qaeda operative Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri in

custody.

 

The secret was part of an effort to ensure other al Qaeda members would

not become aware of the type of intelligence the United States had.

 

Officials described the reports as " credible " but " uncorroborated "

regarding the airplane attacks but that they were taking the reports

seriously.

 

Besides threats of airplane attacks on U.S. and coalition warships,

there were also threats of attacks on commercial shipping, even before

the recent attack on the French oil tanker Limburg.

 

Al-Nashiri is described as being responsible for planning the " concept

of operations " for al Qaeda maritime attacks from the Strait of

Gibraltar in the Mediterranean to the Strait of Malacca in the Far East.

 

He also was said to have been intensively involved in al Qaeda

operations in Yemen, including planning for the attack on the USS Cole

and the failed attack on the USS The Sullivans.

 

Officials could not confirm that there also had been threats of attacks

on U.S. 5th Fleet headquarters in Bahrain, but noted in recent weeks the

threat warning conditions had on more than one occasion been raised to

" Delta " -- the highest threat level.

 

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17 killed

 

An explosives expert, al-Nashiri made the bomb that was placed on a

dinghy that rammed the USS Cole, according to U.S. officials. The

attack, which investigators also say al-Nashiri funded, blew a hole in

the side of the destroyer, also injured 39.

 

Al-Nashiri was the mastermind behind a foiled plot earlier this year to

bomb U.S. and British warships in the Strait of Gibraltar, authorities

say.

 

He also is believed to have been a major player in the August 1998

bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania that killed 224

people, including 12 Americans, and wounded 4,500 others.

 

His cousin, investigators said, was the suicide bomber who carried out

the attack on the embassy in Nairobi, Kenya.

 

Al-Nashiri, who is in his 30s, would rank in the top 10 among al Qaeda's

leadership, said CNN terrorism analyst Peter Bergen. His arrest is

comparable in importance to Binalshibh's recent apprehension, Bergen

said.

 

" Eventually, if these arrests keep going at this rate, they will start

getting some of the real top people, " Bergen said.

 

U.S. officials said last Friday the United States had a senior al Qaeda

leader in custody, but did not release his name.

 

They had been reluctant to share details of al-Nashiri's capture,

worried that if his identity and the country in which he was caught

became public knowledge, their investigation might be compromised.

 

Different names, Different Operations

 

Born in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, al-Nashiri has operated under several

aliases, according to officials, and it was under a fictitious name that

he engineered the Cole assault.

 

It was after the August 1998 embassy bombings in Africa that al-Nashiri

-- calling himself Mohammed Omar al-Harazi at the time -- called

conspirators in Yemen with a proposal: attacking a U.S. warship, a U.S.

investigator close to the case said.

 

U.S. and allied officials also have said al-Nashiri has operated under

the alias Abdul Rahman Hussein al-Nashari.

 

Like other top al Qaeda officials, including bin Laden and Ayman

al-Zawahiri, he was one the " Afghan Arabs " who fought against the Soviet

Union in Afghanistan in the 1980s, officials said.