Posted on 07/30/2004 3:29:25 AM PDT by Dog
ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - A top al Qaeda operative, one of the world's most wanted men with a multi-million-dollar price on his head, is resisting questioning by Pakistani interrogators seeking clues to the hiding place of Osama bin Laden, officials said Friday. Investigators are scouring a computer and several disks seized when they captured Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani and 13 others after a 14-hour gunbattle with security forces at the weekend in the city of Gujarat, 110 miles southeast of Islamabad, intelligence sources told Reuters Friday.
The suspects were being interrogated in the eastern city of Lahore.
But Ghailani, born in Zanzibar in Tanzania and wanted by the United States for his role in the 1998 bombings of two U.S. embassies in East Africa that killed 224 people, had given little away, one intelligence source said.
"He is still tight-lipped," the official said.
Ghailani was captured along with his Uzbek wife and two South Africans after his driver led police to his hide-out, the intelligence source said. Among those found in the house were three women and five children.
Ghailani had brought two other foreign comrades to his safe house after the group became nervous that security forces were closing in on the hotel in Gujarat where they had been staying, the intelligence source said.
Security forces were now searching for the Pakistani who rented the house for Ghailani.
"BIG ACHIEVEMENT"
Ghailani, who is in his early 30s and goes by the nicknames "Foopie" and "Ahmed the Tanzanian," was indicted in New York in 1998 for the synchronised blasts that blew up the U.S. embassies in Nairobi and Tanzania, killing 224 people.
Ghailani, who reportedly could not drive a car at the time of the bombings in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam, is probably the most senior al Qaeda operative caught in Pakistan since the arrest in March 2003 of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the suspected mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on New York and Washington. It is a big achievement for our security forces," Interior Minister Faisal Saleh Hayat said. Ghailani and his companions had spent time in Afghanistan fighting with the Taliban and were preparing to flee Pakistan along with their families, using fake travel papers, when the authorities caught up with them, a ministry official said.
Pakistan had not yet received a request from the United States for Ghailani's extradition, Hayat said.
"He has been in Pakistan for some time. We have to establish the exact nature of his activities and scope of his network in Pakistan. Only after we have exhausted our inquiries shall we be able to hand him over ... to the U.S.," he said.
The United States was offering a reward of $5 million for the capture of the cherubic-faced, diminutive Tanzanian. Earlier reports on the FBI's Most Wanted Terrorist List had specified a reward of $25 million -- the same bounty offered for bin Laden.
U.S. officials suspect bin Laden and his deputy Ayman al-Zawahri and other al Qaeda supporters are hiding somewhere in rugged tribal areas along the Afghan border and have put pressure on Pakistan to pursue foreign militants in the lawless region.
Washington blamed al Qaeda for the devastating East Africa bombings and fired missiles on Afghan military training camps run by bin Laden shortly afterwards. Bin Laden escaped unhurt.
Four al Qaeda supporters were sentenced to life in prison in October 2001 by a Manhattan federal judge for the bombings. The FBI and the Manhattan U.S. Attorney's office had no immediate comment on Ghailani's arrest.
© Reuters 2004. All Rights Reserved.
fyi..
No other names given on the 13 others? I haven't seen any in all of the articles about this raid?
His driver is now $25 million richer today.
So remove his lips then, slowly.
I wonder if the surgeon did plastic surgery.
This will work, 24X7 Barney music. "I love you, you love me...."
I got your ping, thanks. I wondered if there were some other big players that they were being quiet about.
It is a strange coincidence that these South Africans were arrested the same week a South African woman was arrested in the US on terrorism charges.
Maybe the purple lace t-back thong from Victorias Secret will change his attitude.
"oh no not the purple lace t-back thong from Victorias Secret torture, I will tell I will tell"
I can see it now. 28 days of the Slimes talking about how an Al Queada senior member was tortured with a purple lace t-back thong from Victorias Secret.
Pakistanis: (laughter) "Do you think you are at abu Ghraib, boy? Where all they do is put panties on your heads and take pictures?" (more laughter) "You will talk to us."
He may not have a lot of current information. Typically, AQ will place publicly known figures out of the mainstream for security purposes, and the article tends to support this by saying he has been in the safehouse he was captured in for some time.
Still, it sends a message to others, and he will be able to provide information on events he was involved in. In spite of Al Qaeda's best efforts, a transplanted jihadi isn't going to find much to talk about with the average man on the street. He will have heard and seen enough to piece together some sort of overview, if not actual details of ongoing operations.
Too bad for him the Paks caught him, many American prisoners have broken simply from the threat of being turned over to them. Maybe if he's a good boy, he'll be able to earn a ticket to Camp Delta.
The other reports I've heard have been saying that "we're learning important information from him". Somehow, he seems more likely to "resist" than to talk.
I find it totally amazing these guys are able to fool a "believer" into putting a bomb on their back when they themselves are able to be taken alive. At least the Spain terrorists had enough guts to blow themselves up! The fact they were taken alive should send a message to the rest of the idiots.
Admiral Ackbar!!!
Disregard my earlier post. Though the information remains valid, the other thread indicates it probably doesn't apply in this case. Looks like this guy is dirty, looks like he's in the process of running a current operation, and it looks like we might, repeat might, have broken up an imminent attack here in the States.
Naaaaaaahhhhh
Investigators are scouring a computer and several disks seized
Scour away, Geeks! :-)
I don't mock Pakistan's efforts in the war on terror, which have been extraordinarily effective.
The problem is, they're on the other side.
Another find in this raid were MAPS.....be interesting to see what they are all about.
Not all of them..
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