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CNN Saturday Morning News

Report on al Qaeda Op. Captured in Pakistan

Aired September 14, 2002 - 07:03   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

CATHERINE CALLAWAY, CNN ANCHOR: More now on the al Qaeda operative that was captured in Pakistan and his admitted role in the September 11 attacks.
For the latest on Ramzi Binalshibh, we return to CNN's Ash-har Quraishi, who is joining us via videophone from Islamabad. What's the latest from there?

ASH-HAR QURAISHI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, hello, Catherine.

As we've been reporting, U.S. officials say that Ramzi Binalshibh is in the custody of Pakistani authorities. Now, this coming after a series of raids in the port city of Karachi by Pakistani authorities in cooperation with U.S. intelligence forces.

They say that the -- the government says that these raids began on September 9, and on September 11, one year after the terror attacks, they say that one of the most dramatic raids took place. There was a four-hour gun battle that took place as authorities went in to try and apprehend some of these suspected al Qaeda members. In that raid, at least five people were arrested and two were killed.

Now, a total of 12 people have been taken into custody this week, according to the government of Pakistan. They are not going into specifics as to the identities of these people. But according to U.S. officials, one of those people apprehended is believed to be Ramzi Binalshibh, who is suspected to have had a very key role in the terror attacks that occurred last September.

Now, also we're hearing from Pakistani authorities that there may be one other al Qaeda operative, so a total of two very key al Qaeda operatives that are in custody at this time. But so far government officials here being very quiet about exactly who these people are. They are, though, saying that this is somewhat of a big coup in the war against terrorism.

Catherine?

CALLAWAY: Do we know if they're being questioned by U.S. authorities? What is it -- where are they being held? Do you have any information on that?

QURAISHI: Well, according to government officials we've spoken to today, they say that U.S. officials, intelligence, has been used in these operations, but that the interrogation at this point is being conducted by the Pakistani intelligence services here in Pakistan. They say that they're being kept in a safe house in Quraishi at this time. And so far there's been no word of turning over these suspects to U.S. custody.

Catherine?

CALLAWAY: All right, Ash-har, thank you very much, Ash-har. That's Ash-har Quraishi, he's joining us from Islamabad.

Let's go right to our security analyst. Joining us right now to talk about all this is Kelly McCann.

Kelly, a big coup, I guess, in this investigation. You know, I have to ask, what now? Will the U.S. -- certainly anxious to get to him.

KELLY MCCANN, CNN SECURITY ANALYST: Absolutely. It's another example, Catherine, of the long arm of the U.S. And I think it also shows a lot of coordination and working together with our Pakistani counterparts in country.

There's a couple of key points in this apprehension, one of which is, he's second in importance only probably to Zubaydah. I know Peter Bergen had echoed that as well. And that means that it is very much a coup.

Secondly is that despite all the claims about not being taken alive, etcetera, if you looked at the confusion of the post-raid environment, and you think about the confusion and the chaos in the raid environment, how was it that he is still alive?

In fact, what it was his personal conviction to this whole thing, and what set of circumstances could have led to that?

A Pakistani official was quoted in "The Post" as having said it was by sheer luck...

CALLAWAY: Right.

MCCANN: ... which is interesting to me.

And then lastly, and what the American people can take away from this is, "The Post" also reported that he had been recorded saying around 9/11, quote unquote, "Two sticks, a dash, a cake and a stick down." That should let the American people know, if you think about it, a cake down with a stick and then two sticks, nine-one-one, the difficulty in trying to discern what apparently could be very easy to the people who don't know how these things work.

CALLAWAY: All right, let's -- let's...

MCCANN: Without a communications protocol, it's hard.

CALLAWAY: Kelly, let's back up just a little bit now. First, you know, it's believed that he was a former roommate of Mohammed Atta, of course, one of the hijackers, we all know that. And that's what you're talking about, the 9/11 code, was apparently a conversation that Atta had with Binalshibh, right? MCCANN: Exactly. And it shows that if you don't have a communications protocol, something that, you know, most codes are mathematics...

CALLAWAY: Right.

MCCANN: ... but if it's a very informal code, then how do you discern what in fact the real root is? It's very difficult.

CALLAWAY: Now, Binalshibh certainly being held there, but how soon do you think it'll be before the U.S. authorities are able to get in there and question him? And how much will he -- you know, will he allow, will he allow any information? He certainly has not been shy. In fact, we know that his audiotapes have been played on Al Jazeera television.

MCCANN: Which could go to ego, which could go to some exploitable interrogation techniques. There are colocated Americans, obviously, American intelligence people and other entities there that will be with the Pakistanis as they discuss these things with Binalshibh. So I think that that's going to happen almost immediately.

Now, releasing him to our custody is going to be...

CALLAWAY: Right.

MCCANN: ... a different matter.

CALLAWAY: What do you think's going to happen there?

MCCANN: I think that probably we will import some more people to Pakistan to kind of be involved in the process. And when we make the case that in fact he belongs to us, or it should, our jurisdiction goes to him, that a release will be worked out. He may go first to Afghanistan and then perhaps from there to another location.

CALLAWAY: Another story I want to talk about with you quickly is what happened in Buffalo, New York, an interesting development there with law enforcement officials saying that they've rounded up five men in this small town there, this small community, suspected of terrorist activity. What can we learn for this, and do you believe this was a truly active cell?

MCCANN: The number's right. Usually cells operate three to five men. There's an admin-logistics entity and then an operator entity, operatives being people who financially and logistically and admin- support the operator who is the actual trigger puller.

So the number's right. Now, I don't know whether or not they were configured that way, but it fits the model.

I believe that this was also enacted because of information from the same source that actually resulted in the higher threat level, so there's a link there. Interesting to note also, the Yemeni background of these individuals. We've got Binalshibh, who is a Yemeni, and also there were eight more Yemenis in that attack, or the raid in Pakistan.

CALLAWAY: Well...

MCCANN: So you can start to put some dots together (UNINTELLIGIBLE).

CALLAWAY: And they were U.S. citizens, we should say that. They were just...

MCCANN: That's true.

CALLAWAY: ... of Yemeni origin.

I guess what I'm saying is, now, how important are these types of arrests? They may not have been directly involved in a terrorist activity, but providing any support level, you know, any level of support to the terrorists. How, you know, how far are we getting in discovering these small cells that are allegedly operating inside the U.S.?

MCCANN: That's a really telling question for a very strange reason. Experts always talk logistics, amateurs talk tactics. And the reason is, is, you can have the best tactic in the world, but if you can't support it, then you don't have an operation.

So in fact, this could be very, very important.

CALLAWAY: All right. Well, there's certainly a lot to talk about this morning, a lot of developments over the last 24 hours. Kelly, thank you for being with us. I know you're going to be back with us later on this morning, because indeed there is a lot of news. Kelly McCann, thank you.

MCCANN: Thanks, Catherine.

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