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CNN Live At Daybreak

Reid Possibly Part of Previously Unknown Terrorist Network

Aired January 11, 2002 - 05:06   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, here's something that will certainly wake you up. European investigators tell CNN they have traced alleged shoe bomber Richard Reid to a previously unknown group. It's a terror network investigators warn could try again to bring down a plane with concealed explosives.

CNN's Senior International Correspondent Sheila MacVicar is in Paris.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SHEILA MACVICAR, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Hidden in the immigrant neighborhoods of Paris are the secrets of Richard Reid's six days in this city. Somewhere here, just hours before he was scheduled to leave, intelligence sources believe Richard Reid was given the shoes containing the bombs, the bombs he tried to set off on the American Airlines flight to Miami.

French police are urgently trying to retrace his movements. A French anti-terrorism judge is so concerned, he is now working the case full time. Investigators want to know if Reid's trip to Israel last summer was designed to test airline security. And intelligence sources say there is growing evidence he traveled at least once to Afghanistan.

(on camera): European investigators and intelligence sources say they now believe that Richard Reid, far from acting alone, is part of a previously unknown terror network, one which may ultimately prove to be part of al Qaeda. And they warn that within the ranks of that network, there is a very sophisticated bomb maker.

(voice-over): FBI analysis of the shoes showed the bombs were made of two explosives, a combination experts say they have not previously seen -- a military explosive called PETN and a homemade explosive called TATP. TATP was the explosive used by the Hamas suicide bomber who blew himself up outside this Tel Aviv nightclub last June, killing more than 20 others.

PROF. JOSEPH ALMOG, HEBREW UNIVERSITY: This is a rather unusual formula.

MACVICAR: Joseph Almog is the former head of the Israeli police forensic laboratories. TATP was first analyzed in those labs. ALMOG: It's an extremely sensitive material, extremely sensitive. It's very sensitive to friction, to sparks, to blow, and it can explode just by itself.

MACVICAR: European intelligence sources say, ``It is absolutely impossible that Reid made the bombs.'' And the former head of the FBI explosives unit says the bomb maker was very skilled.

CHRIS RONAY, INSTITUTE OF MAKERS OF EXPLOSIVES: The combination of materials in the device and the priming mechanism appears to be quite unusual and sophisticated, hard to concoct it, hard to put it together.

MACVICAR: Given the evidence, investigators now believe there is a logistics base somewhere in Europe, a place where the explosives and the bombs could be manufactured. They do not yet know where.

It is now clear, they say, the crew and passengers on board American Airlines Flight 63 averted a disaster. And they warn of the possibility of more attempts by this previously unknown terror network, of more bombs that could bring down planes concealed in places beyond the limited capabilities of airport screening.

Sheila MacVicar, CNN, Paris.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO: So something else to keep in mind if you're flying somewhere this weekend. Oh, it's scary.

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