Al-Qaida's # 3 Man is captured!!!

[Blimpie]

Let's hear it for the boys and girls fighting in the mountains.....

al-Qaida's No. 3 Man Arrested in Pakistan
By PAUL HAVEN, Associated Press Writer
44 minutes ago

A senior al-Qaida leader, described by U.S. counterterrorism officials as the group's No. 3 man and a close confidant of Osama bin Laden, has been arrested after a firefight in northwestern Pakistan, officials said Wednesday.

In Washington, President Bush said the capture of Abu Farraj al-Libbi "represents a critical victory in the war on terror," and he praised the Pakistani government and President Gen. Pervez Musharraf for the arrest.

"Al-Libbi was a top general for bin Laden," Bush said. "He was a major facilitator and a chief planner for the al-Qaida network. His arrest removes a dangerous enemy who is a direct threat to America and for those who love freedom."

Bush added, "We'll stay on the offensive until al-Qaida is defeated."

Al-Libbi, who allegedly orchestrated two assassination attempts against Musharraf, was arrested after a firefight on the outskirts of Mardan, 30 miles north of Peshawar, capital of the deeply conservative North West Frontier Province, the government and security officials said.

Al-Libbi, a native of Libya, was arrested earlier this week, Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed told The Associated Press.

"This is a very important day for us," Ahmed said. "This arrest gives us a lot of tips, and I can only say that our security agencies are on the right track" in the hunt for bin Laden, Ahmed said.

"This man knew many people and many hide-outs."

A U.S. counterterrorism official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said al-Libbi was the No. 3 al-Qaida figure behind bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri. Al-Libbi assumed more authority within al-Qaida after the March 2003 arrest of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the official said, adding that al-Libbi is believed responsible for planning attacks around the world, including in the United States.

The official said the relationship between bin Laden and al-Libbi predates the formation of al-Qaida in the 1990s. His association with bin Laden goes back to al-Qaida's early days in Sudan, where bin Laden set up a complex of businesses and terror enterprises in 1991.

Interior Minister Aftab Khan Sherpao described al-Libbi as an "al-Qaida planner" who held a senior place in the terror group's hierarchy. He said the U.S. government was offering a $10 million bounty for information leading to al-Libbi's arrest, though he does not appear to be on the FBI's list of the globe's most-wanted terrorists.

Another Libyan, Anas al-Liby, who is wanted in connection with the 1998 bombings of U.S. Embassies in Africa, is on that list. Pakistani officials and a U.S. embassy spokesman in Islamabad said the men are not the same. Al-Libbi or al-Liby simply mean "The Libyan" in Arabic.

Neither minister would provide details on where al-Libbi was captured or where he was being held.

But three Pakistani intelligence officials told AP on condition of anonymity that al-Libbi — who's believed to use at least five aliases — was one of two foreigners arrested Monday after a firefight on the outskirts of Mardan.

One of the officials said 11 more terror suspects — including three Uzbeks, an Afghan and seven Pakistanis — were arrested before dawn Wednesday in the Bajor tribal region. The official would not say what prompted authorities to launch the raid or whether it was linked to al-Libbi's capture.

The intelligence officials said authorities were led to al-Libbi's hide-out by a tip that foreigners had been spotted in the area. The suspect was held overnight at a military facility in Mardan, then transferred by helicopter to the capital, Islamabad, the officials said.

Sherpao would not speculate on whether the arrest might help lead to the capture of bin Laden or al-Zawahri, who have eluded a 3 1/2-year dragnet since the Sept. 11 attacks. Mohammed was handed over to U.S. custody, and his whereabouts are unknown.

"We have no information" about the al-Qaida leaders, Sherpao said. "It's premature to say (whether al-Libbi's arrest will help track them down), but definitely interrogation is going to take place."

A security official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that information from U.S. officials helped Pakistan plan a well-coordinated operation to capture al-Libbi, but that Pakistan also obtained intelligence on al-Libbi from militant suspects it arrested months ago.

The security official said al-Libbi had differences with Uzbeks and other militants who had been reluctant to accept him as a leader.

Al-Libbi reportedly spent time in South Waziristan, a tribal region along the border with Afghanistan that is considered a likely hide-out for bin Laden. But he fled following a series of military operations in the area last year. Authorities had said privately in recent weeks that they believed they were zeroing in on his location.

Before Ahmed's announcement, senior government and military officials repeatedly denied rumors they had al-Libbi in custody.

Al-Libbi is accused of masterminding two bombings against Musharraf in December 2003. The military leader escaped injury but 17 others were killed in one of the attacks.

Sherpao said it was too early to comment on whether al-Libbi might be turned over to the United States, but he stressed there were important cases pending against him in Pakistan.

Musharraf, a key ally in the U.S.-led war on terrorism, named the Libyan as the chief suspect in the bombings against him. He was among six suspects identified as Pakistan's most-wanted terrorists in a poster campaign last year.

A photograph of al-Libbi released by the government Wednesday and taken after his arrest shows a disheveled, bearded man with sunken eyes and what appears to be a skin condition.

It is in striking contrast with the poster photo, in which al-Libbi looks healthy and is dressed in a Western-style suit and tie.

[RedsBaron]

Great news.
Ever notice that while many of the terrorist leaders urge their followers on to suicide attacks, they usually opt for capture rather than death themselves, despite the 72 virgins who supposedly await them if they die in battle?

[Blimpie]

Great news.
Ever notice that while many of the terrorist leaders urge their followers on to suicide attacks, they usually opt for capture rather than death themselves, despite the 72 virgins who supposedly await them if they die in battle?

Yep. That's definitely not going to help the self esteem of all of those poor virgins...

[registerthis]

Great news.
Ever notice that while many of the terrorist leaders urge their followers on to suicide attacks, they usually opt for capture rather than death themselves, despite the 72 virgins who supposedly await them if they die in battle?

There was a hilarious SNL skit about that...it had Bin laden and his goons sitting around a cave, and he was encouraging them all to go out and suicide bomb, because of the 72 virgins or whatever that would be waiting for them.

One of them responds "Yes, oh great sheikh, that sounds great, but I must ask...if...if, what you are saying is true, then why don't you join us?"

"Oh, I will." Bin laden replied. "In, 10 -15 years."

Glad to hear it...sounds like Pakistani forces played a large role in his capture, too.

[GAC]

Good to hear.

[M2]

Osama's gonna be so pissed when he doesn't come back with the pita pockets and babaganouj.

[Yachtzee]

Next up...Number 2!

[RBA]

And the rest of the story......


May 08, 2005

Captured Al-Qaeda kingpin is case of ‘mistaken identity’
Christina Lamb and Mohammad Shehzad Islamabad


NI_MPU('middle');

THE capture of a supposed Al-Qaeda kingpin by Pakistani agents last week was hailed by President George W Bush as “a critical victory in the war on terror”. According to European intelligence experts, however, Abu Faraj al-Libbi was not the terrorists’ third in command, as claimed, but a middle-ranker derided by one source as “among the flotsam and jetsam” of the organisation.

Al-Libbi’s arrest in Pakistan, announced last Wednesday, was described in the United States as “a major breakthrough” in the hunt for Osama Bin Laden.

Bush called him a “top general” and “a major facilitator and chief planner for the Al- Qaeda network”. Condoleezza Rice, secretary of state, said he was “a very important figure”. Yet the backslapping in Washington and Islamabad has astonished European terrorism experts, who point out that the Libyan was neither on the FBI’s most wanted list, nor on that of the State Department “rewards for justice” programme.

Another Libyan is on the FBI list — Anas al-Liby, who is wanted over the 1998 East African embassy bombings — and some believe the Americans may have initially confused the two. When The Sunday Times contacted a senior FBI counter-terrorism official for information about the importance of the detained man, he sent material on al-Liby, the wrong man.

“Al-Libbi is just a ‘middle-level’ leader,” said Jean-Charles Brisard, a French intelligence investigator and leading expert on terrorism finance. “Pakistan and US authorities have completely overestimated his role and importance. He was never more than a regional facilitator between Al-Qaeda and local Pakistani Islamic groups.”

According to Brisard, the arrested man lacks the global reach of Al-Qaeda leaders such as Ayman al-Zawahiri, Bin Laden’s number two, Khalid Shaikh Mohammad, the mastermind of the September 11 attacks, or Anas al-Liby.

Although British intelligence has evidence of telephone calls between al-Libbi and operatives in the UK, he is not believed to be Al-Qaeda’s commander of operations in Europe, as reported.

The only operations in which he is known to have been involved are two attempts to assassinate Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan’s president, in 2003. Last year he was named Pakistan’s most wanted man with a $350,000 (£185,000) price on his head.

No European or American intelligence expert contacted last week had heard of al-Libbi until a Pakistani intelligence report last year claimed he had taken over as head of operations after Khalid Shaikh Mohammad’s arrest. A former close associate of Bin Laden now living in London laughed: “What I remember of him is he used to make the coffee and do the photocopying.”

What is known is that al-Libbi moved from Libya to Pakistan in the mid-1980s before joining the jihad in Afghanistan. He married a Pakistani woman and is said to specialise in maps and diagrams. He is thought to have joined Bin Laden in Sudan with other Libyan nationals in about 1992 and to have become Al-Qaeda’s co-ordinator with home-grown Pakistani terrorist groups after 9/11.

Some believe al-Libbi’s significance has been cynically hyped by two countries that want to distract attention from their lack of progress in capturing Bin Laden, who has now been on the run for almost four years.

Even a senior FBI official admitted that al-Libbi’s “influence and position have been overstated”. But this weekend the Pakistani government was sticking to the line that al-Libbi was the third most important person in the Al-Qaeda network.

One American official tried to explain the absence of al-Libbi’s name on the wanted list by saying: “We did not want him to know he was wanted.” Whatever his importance, al-Libbi is the sixth Al-Qaeda figure to have been caught in Pakistan, suggesting that the country is now the organisation’s centre of operations. The interior minister, Aftab Khan Sherpao, conceded that Bin Laden and his deputy might be hiding in a Pakistani city. “But the capture of al-Libbi will have made them very apprehensive. Whether big fry or small fry, they’re on the run, I can tell you that.”

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article...602568,00.html

[Rojo]

I was going to post on this but I was afraid of looking like I was rooting against the war on terror. Anyhow the stuff they mentioned in the article: no reward, no Wanted Listing pointed toward something other than a number 3 man.

[Jaycint]

So who IS Al-Qaeda's #3? I'm just curious. Does somebody have a chart somewhere? Suppose UBL and Zawahiri where both blown up in a tent outside Peshewar while playing scrabble(i know, wishful thinking). Who takes the reins then?

[Johnny Footstool]

I was going to post on this but I was afraid of looking like I was rooting against the war on terror.

It's really sad that people have to be concerned about that.

Of course, when most questions are greeted with accusations of disloyalty, suggestions that you leave the country, and jingoistic shouts of "God Bless America and God Bless President Bush," that concern is understandable.

[Rojo]

suggestions that you leave the country, and jingoistic shouts of "God Bless America and God Bless President Bush,"

Its just that some folks think that a lot of us who opposed the war in Iraq or don't like Bush are rooting against American interests. If I throw a wet blanket on every bit of "good news", no matter how dubious, it fuels that fire.

[Jaycint]

Its just that some folks think that a lot of us who opposed the war in Iraq or don't like Bush are rooting against American interests. If I throw a wet blanket on every bit of "good news", no matter how dubious, it fuels that fire.

I have no problem with a wet blanket being thrown as long as it's legit. You won't hear me ever tell someone they need to leave the country just because they don't agree with an administration's policies. I think the far left and the far right are both ridiculous in some cases.