"US says 9/11 suspect planned Heathrow attack"

Thursday, September 9, 2006

US says 9/11 suspect planned Heathrow attack 
By James Sturcke
United Kingdom - The Guardian


The terror suspect accused of masterminding the September 11 attacks also
planned to crash hijacked airliners into Heathrow airport, according to
documents released by the US government.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed conceived a plot to hit Heathrow after the attacks on
America five years ago, the documents from the US office of the director of
national intelligence said.

Another alleged al-Qaida member Ramzi Bin al-Shibh, described as a "key
facilitator" in 9/11, was said to have been a "lead operative" in the UK
plan, which the US said was disrupted in 2003.

The details emerged in profiles of 14 terror suspects, including Mohammed
and Bin al-Shibh, who, the US announced yesterday, have been transferred
from secret CIA prisons around the world to Guantánamo Bay in Cuba.

During a speech about the CIA programme, the US president, George Bush, said
information from those held had "helped stop a plot to hijack passenger
planes and fly them into Heathrow or the Canary Wharf in London".

Bin al-Shibh was said to have been a would-be 9/11 hijacker who was foiled
by his inability to obtain a US visa. He was said to have who fled
Afghanistan after the overthrow of the Taliban in late 2001 and headed to
Karachi.

There, he and Mohammed worked on "follow-on plots against the west,
particularly the Heathrow plot", the US document said, before his capture in
2002.

The statement continued: "He was tasked by KSM [Mohammed] to recruit
operatives in Saudi Arabia for an attack on Heathrow airport, and, as of his
capture, Bin al-Shibh had identified four operatives for the operation."

The documents claim Mohammed "is one of history's most infamous terrorists"
and that his capture three years ago "deprived al-Qaida of one of its most
capable senior operatives".

In another document, summarising the so-called "High Value Terrorist
Detainee Programme", the office of the director of national intelligence
says the "Heathrow Airport Plot" was disrupted in 2003 on the basis of
information that came from detainees.

"In 2003 the US and several partners - acting on information from several
detainees - disrupted a plot to attack Heathrow airport using hijacked
commercial airliners," it said. "KSM and his network were behind the
planning for this attack."

The US government gave similar information on an alleged Heathrow attack
last autumn, but merely said then that the planning had been by "a major
9/11 operational figure". Yemen-born Bin al-Shibh was captured in September
2002 at a house in Karachi, Pakistan after a shootout.

Details emerged in June of a US security report that al-Qaida had planned to
hijack aircraft and crash planes into Heathrow and Canary Wharf.

The British landmarks were among a number of targets around the world being
considered by terrorist operatives, US television channel ABC News said at
the time.

Reports of a possible plot against Canary Wharf also emerged in late 2004,
but the details were murky and British officials never confirmed them.

In February 2003, military vehicles were deployed at Heathrow over supposed
terrorism fears.

The US documents said Bin al-Shibh had originally been earmarked to be one
of the pilots on 9/11, and met Mohammed together with Mohammed Atta, the
alleged ringleader of the hijackers.

Scotland Yard said last night that it was "not prepared to discuss" Mr
Bush's comments.

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