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CNN Live Saturday

Osama bin Laden Linked to Hijackers

Aired September 29, 2001 - 14:10   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.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: I want to get the latest on the ongoing and growing investigation. More arrests to tell you about and more information rising to the surface.

Our Susan Candiotti is here in the Washington bureau to bring us up to speed -- Susan.

SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good afternoon.

KAGAN: Good to see you.

CANDIOTTI: More today on the links between the 19 suspected hijackers and Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network. CNN justice correspondent Kelli Arena has learned four of the hijackers received training at camps in Afghanistan, according to an intelligence source. And authorities now believe most of the hijackers have connections to al Qaeda.

Sources say those suspects include Mohamed Atta, Khalid al-Midar and Nawa al-Hasmi. FBI director Robert Mueller Friday stressed the Afghan ties are only one aspect of the investigation.

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ROBERT MUELLER, FBI DIRECTOR: It's part of the investigation. And part of our investigation, quite obviously, is trying to determine the past histories of each of the hijackers, trace their time in the United States, but also attempt to identify where they were prior to their coming to the United States and track their movements through any number of countries overseas.

And we are in the process of doing it. And we've had, I will say, substantial cooperation for a number of countries that have enabled us to start to put together the picture, but the picture is nowhere near fully painted.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CANDIOTTI: All this as the FBI continues to step up its presence in Germany, where investigators are digging deeper into how and where and who was involved in planning for the September 11 attacks.

It is also where Atta and another hijacking suspect Marwan al- Shehhi once shared an apartment. Law enforcement sources say there is growing evidence, including phone and flight records, that indicate key meetings and training took place in Germany.

And in Great Britain, the FBI anxious to talk with Lofti Raissi. British prosecutors say he's believed to have trained some of the hijackers. The FBI wants Raissi extradited to the U.S. on a criminal complaint. He allegedly lied to the Federal Aviation Administration on the application for his pilot's license.

CNN has learned Raissi at one time took flight training with suspected hijacker Hani Hanjour. They both when to school at a facility in Arizona. Three of the four hijackers also lived in Arizona at various times with Hanjour.

And so, Daryn, connections continue to be drawn between overseas cells and those so-called foot soldiers that carried out the attacks here on U.S. soil.

KAGAN: A question, Susan, about how much was planned for September 11. Are officials looking into the possibility that there were more than four hijackings planned and that these hijackers weren't four for four, maybe not as successful as that in fact they intended to be?

CANDIOTTI: Certainly they have not discounted that possibility. They are looking at a number of different factors, flight records. They're looking at flight manifests, all kinds of things. Phone records, to try to look back and look ahead, as well as taking a closer look at least three other people.

Raissi, that's why they want to talk to him about future plans, as well as someone who is arrested a month before the attacks, who was currently detained, who was after flight training in Minnesota, along with two other people, who were taken off a train in Texas and are currently under detention.

The FBI is trying to talk to them as well, figuring they might also have some information.

KAGAN: So a lot of questions, but it's fascinating how much investigators have been together and put all...sure, piece it together and tell the story so far.

Susan Candiotti, thank you. Thank you for the latest there.

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