Despite arrests, Pakistan is terror refuge
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-08-03 08:46

Vital information gleaned from the arrests of a senior al-Qaeda terrorist and a militant computer expert highlights the progress Pakistan is making in the fight against terrorism. But it also illustrates that this Islamic nation remains a refuge for Osama bin Laden's group, where the most wanted men in the world can hide out for years.

"We know that al-Qaeda is here. They have their sleeper cells in Pakistan, and we are trying to eliminate them," Interior Minister Faisal Saleh Hayyat told The Associated Press.

Residents look at house where top al-Qaeda member Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani was arrested after a gun battle in Gujrat, Pakistan, July 30, 2004. Pakistani intelligence agents found plans for new attacks against the United States and Britain on a computer seized during the arrest of Ghailani, the Pakistani information minister said Monday, Aug. 2, 2004. [AP]

Intelligence agents found plans for new attacks in e-mails on the computer of Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani, a Tanzanian arrested July 25 after a 12-hour gunbattle in the eastern city of Gujrat, said Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed.

"We got a few e-mails from Ghailani's computer about (plans for) attacks in the U.S. and U.K.," he told the AP, adding that the information has been shared with Pakistan's allies — a reference to the United States.

Officials also are getting a wealth of information from a militant computer and communications expert arrested in an earlier raid in July. The man would send messages using code words to al-Qaeda suspects, a Pakistani intelligence official told the AP on condition of anonymity.

Ahmed confirmed the arrest but refused to give details.

"He is a very wanted man, but I cannot say his name now," the information minister said. He said the man was a militant, but refused to say if he was part of al-Qaeda.

Pakistani officials would not speculate on whether the information from Ghailani and the computer expert is what prompted Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge to issue a warning Sunday about a possible al-Qaeda attack on financial institutions in New York, Washington and Newark, N.J.

However, a U.S. counterterrorism official said Sunday's warning stems in large part from Pakistan's capture several weeks ago of an al-Qaeda operative.

The operative was privately identified as Mohammad Naeem Noor Khan, also known as Abu Talha, said to be a communications expert. The Pakistani intelligence official said, however, that the name was an alias; he would not say what the man's real name was.

At his news conference, Ridge specifically thanked Pakistan for its help in the war on terror.

The arrests of both men have raised hopes that more top suspects might soon fall. Bin Laden and his top deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, are believed hiding in the mountainous no-man's land between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

But a second Pakistani intelligence official who was involved in the arrest of Ghailani cautioned against unrealistic expectations.

"Naturally, these interrogations help to gain an understanding of their network ... but that doesn't mean that we are closing in on bin Laden," he said.

Bin Laden and his deputy have spent nearly three years avoiding a dragnet by the 20,000-strong U.S.-led military coalition in Afghanistan and a 70,000-member Pakistani force on this side of the border.

Pakistan has arrested more than 550 al-Qaeda suspects since the Sept. 11 attacks, turning most of them over to the United States. Among the higher-profile arrests are Abu Zubaydah, Ramzi Binalshibh and Khalid Shaikh Mohammed — all senior aides to bin Laden.

But that success is the silver lining to a dark cloud — this nation of 150 million remains a favorite hiding place for terrorists — from the teeming metropolis of Karachi, to the tribal regions along the Western border with Afghanistan, to towns like Gujrat in eastern Punjab.

Al-Qaeda is believed behind the Friday attempt to assassinate prime minister-designate Shaukat Aziz, as well as two bids to take out Musharraf in March. Both men survived, but more than two dozen Pakistanis died.

"When they tried to flush the terrorists out of Afghanistan they came to Pakistan. When they flushed them from the tribal regions, they spread all over the country," said Talat Masood, a security analyst and former Pakistani general. "What we are facing now is very complex. It is one of the greatest terrorist challenges and it is not going to end soon."

Despite the government's strong support of the United States, the nation is home to dozens of homegrown militant groups — some with roots in the Kashmir conflict, others that sprung up during the Soviet war in Afghanistan.

They and their sympathizers have helped al-Qaeda fugitives hide, sometimes for years.

Ghailani arrived in Pakistan on a Kenyan Airlines flight to Karachi on Aug. 6, 1998, a day before the bombs went off in Kenya and Tanzania, killing more than 200 people, including 12 Americans. He was a ghost until his arrest nearly six years later, apparently as he was planning to flee the country.

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