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U.S. Pressuring Khalid Shaikh Mohammed to Reveal Plots

Aired March 03, 2003 - 05:0   ET

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

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


CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Well, the U.S. is pressuring Khalid Shaikh Mohammed to reveal plots for any future terrorist operations. Mohammed is the suspected mastermind of the September 11 attacks. He's been linked to nearly every al Qaeda attack of the past five years. That's according to the senior U.S. intelligence official. Pakistani agents captured Mohammed on Saturday and officials here, as you might imagine, are very happy. Mohammed is now in U.S. custody at an undisclosed location.
For more now on just how big this arrest is, we take you live to Jordan.

Our Mike Boettcher joins us from the capital, Amman -- good morning.

MIKE BOETTCHER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Good morning, Carol.

It is absolutely huge. Khalid Shaikh Mohammed was a person who was in constant contact with cells throughout the world. And there are other intelligence officials who say it was more than just five years. He was involved in almost every attack for the last 10 years, dating back to the first World Trade Center attack.

It is expected that it will be a huge body blow to cells around the world. It will throw them off. They will have to change plans. They will have to move. So, Carol, it's a very, very big thing.

COSTELLO: It is a very big thing. Can you get into more about what this does to al Qaeda?

BOETTCHER: Well, it certainly leaves one person left who has not been apprehended as the four top lieutenants for al Qaeda, and that's Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi. That's one person. And Zarqawi was involved in al Qaeda cells going from the Middle East, in this region, all the way into Europe, responsible, it's thought, for helping cells that were trying to develop ricin in Europe.

So it will be a very big body blow having Khalid Shaikh Mohammed gone. Before there were two people, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and also Zarqawi. But now it's just Zarqawi. It will also disrupt these cells because he had to have had, according to intelligence sources I've spoken to, he had to have had the numbers, the cells' locations, those sorts of things with him. In the past, that sort of information has been coded and it's taken a while to decode that. But it's believed if he didn't have it on paper, it's in his head and that will make these cells out in the world feel very uncomfortable, make them move and make them more vulnerable. COSTELLO: Yes, but does he know where Osama bin Laden is and will he help investigators find him?

BOETTCHER: Well, I talked to one coalition intelligence official recently who told me he had to have known where Osama bin Laden is, although we were told that they never traveled together since 9/11. They traveled separately, never in the same location. But they would have been in contact because Khalid Shaikh Mohammed was the filter, so to speak. The top orders came down and Khalid Shaikh Mohammed executed those orders.

And in order to receive that information, he would have had to have been speaking to the top people in al Qaeda, Ayman el-Zawahri and Osama bin Laden.

COSTELLO: Mike Boettcher reporting live for us this morning.

We'll talk more about the arrest of Mohammed at the bottom of the hour when we go live to our Islamabad bureau chief, Ash-Har Quraishi, in Pakistan. And we'll also talk Turkey, Iraq and check out the nuances in the news with our international editor, David Clinch. That's also in our next half hour.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com






Aired March 3, 2003 - 05:0   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Well, the U.S. is pressuring Khalid Shaikh Mohammed to reveal plots for any future terrorist operations. Mohammed is the suspected mastermind of the September 11 attacks. He's been linked to nearly every al Qaeda attack of the past five years. That's according to the senior U.S. intelligence official. Pakistani agents captured Mohammed on Saturday and officials here, as you might imagine, are very happy. Mohammed is now in U.S. custody at an undisclosed location.
For more now on just how big this arrest is, we take you live to Jordan.

Our Mike Boettcher joins us from the capital, Amman -- good morning.

MIKE BOETTCHER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Good morning, Carol.

It is absolutely huge. Khalid Shaikh Mohammed was a person who was in constant contact with cells throughout the world. And there are other intelligence officials who say it was more than just five years. He was involved in almost every attack for the last 10 years, dating back to the first World Trade Center attack.

It is expected that it will be a huge body blow to cells around the world. It will throw them off. They will have to change plans. They will have to move. So, Carol, it's a very, very big thing.

COSTELLO: It is a very big thing. Can you get into more about what this does to al Qaeda?

BOETTCHER: Well, it certainly leaves one person left who has not been apprehended as the four top lieutenants for al Qaeda, and that's Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi. That's one person. And Zarqawi was involved in al Qaeda cells going from the Middle East, in this region, all the way into Europe, responsible, it's thought, for helping cells that were trying to develop ricin in Europe.

So it will be a very big body blow having Khalid Shaikh Mohammed gone. Before there were two people, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and also Zarqawi. But now it's just Zarqawi. It will also disrupt these cells because he had to have had, according to intelligence sources I've spoken to, he had to have had the numbers, the cells' locations, those sorts of things with him. In the past, that sort of information has been coded and it's taken a while to decode that. But it's believed if he didn't have it on paper, it's in his head and that will make these cells out in the world feel very uncomfortable, make them move and make them more vulnerable. COSTELLO: Yes, but does he know where Osama bin Laden is and will he help investigators find him?

BOETTCHER: Well, I talked to one coalition intelligence official recently who told me he had to have known where Osama bin Laden is, although we were told that they never traveled together since 9/11. They traveled separately, never in the same location. But they would have been in contact because Khalid Shaikh Mohammed was the filter, so to speak. The top orders came down and Khalid Shaikh Mohammed executed those orders.

And in order to receive that information, he would have had to have been speaking to the top people in al Qaeda, Ayman el-Zawahri and Osama bin Laden.

COSTELLO: Mike Boettcher reporting live for us this morning.

We'll talk more about the arrest of Mohammed at the bottom of the hour when we go live to our Islamabad bureau chief, Ash-Har Quraishi, in Pakistan. And we'll also talk Turkey, Iraq and check out the nuances in the news with our international editor, David Clinch. That's also in our next half hour.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com