OSAMA AIDE - Spills guts under Saudi grilling

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NYPost

OSAMA AIDE SPILLS GUTS UNDER SAUDI GRILLING

By ANDY SOLTIS

November 23, 2001 -- A senior al Qaeda officer, tracked to Saudi Arabia in an elaborate international effort, provided details of attempted and successful terrorist attacks on U.S. targets, it was reported yesterday.

The seizure of Abu Ahmed, the highest-ranking aide to Osama bin Laden to be questioned, was one of the secret successes of an enormous cooperative venture by the United States and 50 foreign countries to arrest terrorist suspects.

Shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks, two suspected members of bin Laden's al Qaeda network were picked up in Bahrain, The Washington Post reported.

Brought to Saudi Arabia for questioning, they revealed the phone number of a Saudi contact working for al Qaeda.

Saudi officials spent weeks tracing calls to the number - and capped the effort by arresting Ahmed, one of his many aliases, and five other al Qaeda members when they tried to leave the country.

Sources said:

* Ahmed revealed that a Yemeni intelligence officer was involved in the October 2000 bombing of the destroyer USS Cole, which killed 17 U.S. sailors.

* Ahmed had details of attacks planned during millennium celebrations in December 1999 that were thwarted.

* Ahmed knew some of the 19 hijackers who took over four planes on Sept. 11.

Ahmed's information is considered a crucial link in the evidence tying bin Laden to Sept. 11.

Little has been said publicly about the secret CIA war against terror, although President Bush alluded to it Oct. 1 when he said the American people "aren't going to see exactly what's taking place on their TV screens."

Thanks to cooperation with foreign intelligence agencies, 360 people suspected of ties to al Qaeda or other terrorist groups have been arrested around the world with the help - and in some cases, insistence - of the CIA, The Washington Post said.

More than 100 of the arrests were conducted in Europe, more than 100 in the Near East, 30 in Latin America and 20 in Africa, the paper said.

Several suspects arrested in other countries were sent to Egypt for questioning by that country's crack intelligence agency.

Some other agencies, who were unaware of al Qaeda operations in their country, discovered their extent, thanks to the new intelligence-sharing effort.

-- Anonymous, November 23, 2001

Answers

Cool how we're getting smart and extraditing suspects to countries like Egypt and Saudi Arabia that have no problems with more forceful means of interrogation...

-- Anonymous, November 24, 2001

yeah, until they mistake you for one.

-- Anonymous, November 24, 2001

I wonder if the results of this interrogation were responsible for the anti-bin Laden cartoon that appeared in a Saudi newspaper yesterday?

-- Anonymous, November 24, 2001

BF, I don't think it's used for simple suspicion... but when you have someone you know, with ample evidence, is involved in this shit, and they sit back and grin and take the 5th Amendment, or just go "fuck you"... well, I say, send 'em to Egypt, Turkey, etc., where they love to talk to guys like that...

The threat alone will cause more than a few to talk... funny how these jihad folks don't care to be subjected to their islamic brethren's laws and practices...

-- Anonymous, November 24, 2001


Gimme a minute here, Carl, and I'll get some ample evidence for you to win a free trip.

Some ample evidence isn't so ample as other ample evidence.

LOL

Fortunately we don't hear too much about those that are sent there.

-- Anonymous, November 24, 2001



Grilling...quite possibly literally.

-- Anonymous, November 24, 2001

LOL, Sam! You put into words what most of us were thinking. . . hoping?

-- Anonymous, November 24, 2001

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