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Mossad concludes hundreds carried out 9/11 without leaks
Fri Sep 20 04:28:00 2002
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Mossad concludes hundreds carried out 9/11 without leaks
http://worldtribune.com/worldtribune/breaking_4.html

SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM
Thursday, September 19, 2002

MOSCOW — Al Qaida employed at least 500 people for up to two years in
planning and conducting the suicide attacks on New York and Washington a year
ago, a Russian strategist told a news conference here.

Alexander Konovalov, president of the Moscow-based Strategic Studies Institute,
said the assessment was obtained from Israeli intelligence, Middle East Newsline
reported. He said the large-scale Al Qaida effort succeeded in preventing any leaks
of its plot.

"I have talked with Mossad officers and they say that this terrorist act was prepared
by at least 500 people for 18-24 months," Alexander Konovalov, president of the
Moscow-based Strategic Studies Institute, said.

"That means that for 24 months 500 people moved between the continents, studied
to fly, did the planning, chose the planes to be hijacked . . . . [T]hey needed planes
that took off not far from the target but flew to a remote destination, they needed
planes filled with kerosene to the top."

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Konovalov told a news conference on Thursday that the Al Qaida agents thoroughly
researched airlines and their schedules to ensure the exact time of the strike. He
cited the hijackings of two airliners from Boston to Los Angeles.

"And no leaks," Konovalov said. "No one ever dropped a hint, no words were
intercepted. The [U.S.] Echelon System constantly scanned the air and taps
communication, fax and e-mail messages by key words. Usually the key words are
like revolution, uprising, strike and so on."

The Russian strategist said U.S. intelligence sought the wrong key words in Al
Qaida communications. He said this would require international cooperation on
terrorism.

"Intelligence services do not like to coordinate their activities even with their allies,"
Konovalov said. "But the world in which we live has changed."

[Western intelligence sources said the United States is examining Pakistan's claim
that Osama Bin Laden was killed in the U.S. air strike on the Tora Bora caves late
last year. The sources told the official Kuwait news agency that Pakistan has found
evidence of Bin Laden's death in a graveyard in the Khost province near the
Afghan-Pakistani border. A senior intelligence official told KUNA that in early
September U.S. intelligence agents took photographs and might have conducted
DNA tests of two graves, one of which might contain Bin Laden's remains.]

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The center has focused on counterterrorism and the lessons of the Sept. 11, 2001
attacks. Konovalov said the center will soon publish a book on the subject.

Konovalov said Russia will not support any U.S. attack on Iraq, saying Moscow
does not see any connection between Baghdad and Al Qaida. But he added that
Russia would continue to cooperate with the United States regardless of its effort to
topple the Saddam regime.

"We shouldn't declare that we are withdrawing from the anti-terrorist coalition," he
said. "Saddam is not worth ruining the anti-terrorist coalition. I am sure that it won't
come to the collapse of the anti-terrorist coalition and a new rollback in relations.
Yes, there will be some cooling, some distancing. But at the end of the day friends
tend to make mistakes, they need not necessarily be separated if one of them
cannot explain to the other that a certain course of action would be a mistake."
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