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Arrests in Iraq

Aired July 09, 2003 - 10:03   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.


LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: We continue this hour with the coalition dragnet in Iraq and the arrest of wanted Iraqis. Among the new captures, two members of the 55 most wanted, and an intelligence officer who may have been linked to the 9/11 hijackers.
Our CNN security correspondent David Ensor is following these arrests and joins us with details.

David, hello.

DAVID ENSOR, CN SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Daryn.

Well, as you mentioned, the arrest yesterday of an Iraqi intelligence officer named Ahmed Al Ani is being greeted with a great deal of satisfaction by U.S. intelligence officials. This is a man who was an intelligence officer in the Iraqi service, based in Prague for quite some time. And there were reports based on information that Czech officials had that he had met with Mohammed Atta, which of course, pretty much everyone knows was considered the ring leader of the September 11th hijackers that flew the planes on that day.

Now, these pictures were believed to have suggested there was a meeting between Atta and Al Ani. These are actually pictures of Atta collecting money at a bank in the United States, which raises the problem with this story, which is that U.S. officials say they have no evidence themselves that Mohammad Atta ever went to Prague in April of 2001, when this meeting was supposed to have many place. Still it will be a subject of great interest to U.S. intelligence and military officials as they question Mr. Al Ani as to whether he had any kind of a meeting or any kind of connection at all with Al Qaeda. Obviously, if he did, it would be the first concrete evidence that there might have been a connection between the Iraqi regime and the attacks of 9/11.

Now as you mentioned, there have been two additional important arrests that the U.S. is announcing. Misban Qatar Hadi (ph), and Mahmoud Diad Al Ahmed (ph), who was the former interior minister, were both taken in in recent days. That makes 34 of the 55 senior Iraqi officials who are on that deck of cards that we see one of here now that are now in American custody. They, too, may have interesting information about how the Iraqi regime did its business, and how it may have concealed weapons of mass destruction -- Daryn.

KAGAN: And, David, as more and more of these Iraqi officials are taken into custody, do we have any more information about what happens to them, where they're taken? ENSOR: Well, in the first instance, most of these prisoners are in the hands of the U.S. military. So they are facing a long period of questioning, interrogation by military interrogators, the Defense Intelligence Agency, one assumes.

Most of them, we are hearing, have not been overly cooperative, although, over time, some of them are beginning to give useful information -- Daryn.

KAGAN: David Ensor in Washington, thank you for that.

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 July 9, 2003 - 10:03   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: We continue this hour with the coalition dragnet in Iraq and the arrest of wanted Iraqis. Among the new captures, two members of the 55 most wanted, and an intelligence officer who may have been linked to the 9/11 hijackers.
Our CNN security correspondent David Ensor is following these arrests and joins us with details.

David, hello.

DAVID ENSOR, CN SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Daryn.

Well, as you mentioned, the arrest yesterday of an Iraqi intelligence officer named Ahmed Al Ani is being greeted with a great deal of satisfaction by U.S. intelligence officials. This is a man who was an intelligence officer in the Iraqi service, based in Prague for quite some time. And there were reports based on information that Czech officials had that he had met with Mohammed Atta, which of course, pretty much everyone knows was considered the ring leader of the September 11th hijackers that flew the planes on that day.

Now, these pictures were believed to have suggested there was a meeting between Atta and Al Ani. These are actually pictures of Atta collecting money at a bank in the United States, which raises the problem with this story, which is that U.S. officials say they have no evidence themselves that Mohammad Atta ever went to Prague in April of 2001, when this meeting was supposed to have many place. Still it will be a subject of great interest to U.S. intelligence and military officials as they question Mr. Al Ani as to whether he had any kind of a meeting or any kind of connection at all with Al Qaeda. Obviously, if he did, it would be the first concrete evidence that there might have been a connection between the Iraqi regime and the attacks of 9/11.

Now as you mentioned, there have been two additional important arrests that the U.S. is announcing. Misban Qatar Hadi (ph), and Mahmoud Diad Al Ahmed (ph), who was the former interior minister, were both taken in in recent days. That makes 34 of the 55 senior Iraqi officials who are on that deck of cards that we see one of here now that are now in American custody. They, too, may have interesting information about how the Iraqi regime did its business, and how it may have concealed weapons of mass destruction -- Daryn.

KAGAN: And, David, as more and more of these Iraqi officials are taken into custody, do we have any more information about what happens to them, where they're taken? ENSOR: Well, in the first instance, most of these prisoners are in the hands of the U.S. military. So they are facing a long period of questioning, interrogation by military interrogators, the Defense Intelligence Agency, one assumes.

Most of them, we are hearing, have not been overly cooperative, although, over time, some of them are beginning to give useful information -- Daryn.

KAGAN: David Ensor in Washington, thank you for that.

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