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CNN Live At Daybreak
War on Terror Expanding; Police Closing on Pearl's Kidnappers
Aired February 06, 2002 - 06:01 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: OK, police in Karachi, Pakistan say they are closing in on American reporter Daniel Pearl's kidnappers. Investigators have now identified Pakistani militant Sheik Omar Saeed as the primary suspect, but they are also questions surrounding the leader of a fundamentalist Islamic group.
CNN's Andrea Koppel has our story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANDREA KOPPEL, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): When "Wall Street Journal" reporter Daniel Pearl disappeared in Karachi, Pakistan last month, he thought he was on his way to interview this man, Sheik Mohammed ali Shad (ph) Gilani, the head of Jamaat ul-Fuqra, a fundamentalist Islamic group active in Pakistan, the United States and Canada.
PETER BERGEN, TERRORISM ANALYST: He's some sort of a mysterious figure about which -- about which very little is known. More is known about the group than about the leader.
KOPPEL: Pearl had been hot on Gilani's trail for weeks suspecting there might be a link between Richard Reid, the alleged American Airline shoe bomber and Gilani's group. Once police realized Pearl had been kidnapped, Gilani became a prime suspect. That despite the fact Gilani was not in Karachi when Pearl disappeared, but rather at home in Rawalpindi, where he voluntarily turned himself in.
U.S. officials say they're still in the words of one senior State Department official, "not convinced Gilani's told us all he knows".
(on camera): Gilani's group is not well known. Fuqra is an Arabic word, which means "the impoverished," but officials say Gilani founded the group in the early 1980's as an Islamic sect, which seeks to purify Islam through violence, and for years had been singled out by the State Department as an active terrorist group.
(voice-over): Active especially in the U.S. and Canada where there are an estimated one to 3,000 members. In October 1992, for instance, FBI agents raided an ul-Fuqra compound in Denver, Colorado seizing more than 60 assault weapons, ammunition, and explosives, as well as handwritten documents tying members to previous attacks. Since the early 80's ul-Fuqra members, who are also U.S. citizens, had been linked to or implicated in at least two dozen fire bombings, assassinations, and other violent acts across the country. In recent years, though, these attacks suddenly stopped. It wasn't until Daniel Pearl's kidnapping that ul-Fuqra and Gilani were back in the news.
Andrea Koppel, CNN, at the State Department.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: And in 30 minutes we will get a live update from Ben Wedeman on the search for Daniel Pearl, so you'll want to stick around for that.
An American missionary couple being held by Islamic rebels of the Philippines say they won't be released unless a ransom is paid. A three-page letter from Gracia and Martin Burnham was written almost two weeks ago. It was brought to Zamboanga yesterday. They were kidnapped last May be Abu Sayyaf guerillas. It's believed they are somewhere on the island of Basilan, off of Zamboanga, a stronghold of the group linked to al Qaeda.
CNN's Maria Ressa tells us U.S. troops are working with Filipino troops, but there are questions about just who's in charge.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MARIA RESSA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): U.S. Special Operations General Donald Wurster (ph) is taking on a new job, that of a diplomat. Here meeting the mayor of Zamboanga, where the bulk of 660 U.S. soldiers will base to help in the Philippines war on terror.
The American presence has triggered a love-hate reaction in America's only former colony in Asia, bringing up issues of sovereignty. It's against the Philippine constitution for any American soldier to go into actual combat, but in the next few weeks about 160 U.S. Special Forces will accompany Filipino troops on patrols like this.
They will be there only to train and assist, but American soldiers will be armed and can fire back in self-defense. That has caused a political controversy in the capital.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This provision is (ph) a statement allowing the Americans to fire back. It is allowing the American commander to take unilateral actions.
RESSA: Not so, says the American commander.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If an American soldier sees a pop-up threat, he'll defend himself. And the Philippine soldier next to him will do the same. And that is how -- that is exactly the types of arrangements that are most appropriate on the battlefield where we don't talk about the wrangling of the wording.
RESSA: So in combat areas, who is in command?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Among allies should not be a big problem. It could always be worked out on the level of the ground commanders. RESSA: That seems acceptable. The Filipino soldiers here who stand to get $100 million in military assistance and the people who live with a constant security threat.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: These people who talk too much should stop talking because we here, we certainly welcome all this military exercises.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was nice meeting ...
RESSA: What they want here is peace and if Americans will help, so be it.
(on camera): But President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo still has a political fight on her hands. Critics in the capital are questioning the legal bases for these military exercises. The Supreme Court has given her a little more than a week to respond.
Maria Ressa, CNN, Zamboanga City, the Philippines.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: Let's talk about the war on terror. It could play out in Iraq. It's one of the countries in what President Bush calls an "axis of evil". Bush administration is brushing off Iraq's recent offer for a dialogue with United Nations Chief Kofi Annan.
CNN national security correspondent David Ensor has details.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DAVID ENSOR, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Saddam Hussein will not be permitted, say U.S. officials, to use talks with the U.N.'s Kofi Annan to wriggle out of giving up his weapons of mass destruction.
COLIN POWELL, SECRETARY OF STATE: It should be a very short discussion. The inspectors have to go back in under our terms, under no one else's terms, under the terms of the Security Council resolution. The burden is upon this evil regime to demonstrate to the world that they are not doing the kinds of things we suspect them of.
ENSOR: Officials note the offer to talk to the U.N. without preconditions came only after President Bush's tough talk in the State of the Union speech.
GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: States like these and their terrorist allies constitute an axis of evil.
RICHARD BUTLER, FORMER UNITED NATIONS CHIEF WEAPONS INSPECTOR: I think that this is Iraq's attempt to head off what was threatened in the president's State of the Union speech.
ENSOR: What may have Baghdad worried is that the speech suggested Mr. Bush now agrees with hawks in his administration like Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz who have argued that the war on terror should include military action against Saddam Hussein.
Secretary Powell, in the past leery about taking on Iraq for fear of dividing the international coalition against al Qaeda, is also talking tough.
POWELL: It does remain U.S. policy to try to achieve regime change.
ENSOR: The Iraqis may also be worried by the closer cooperation between Russia and the U.S. since September 11. Until now Russia has blocked attempts at the U.N. to impose so-called smart sanctions on Iraq, tighter sanctions to stop weapons technologies from reaching the Iraqi missile and weapons programs while easing the plight of the Iraqi people.
Now U.S. and Russian officials are talking about how Russia might be able to recoup billions in debts Iraq owes from Soviet times in exchange for supporting the new tougher arms inspection regime.
The administration strategy for now, keep Baghdad guessing as to what it may do and when. Some analysts predict the administration may push for arms inspectors who can go absolutely anywhere in Iraq and then say any place they are denied entry would be bombed.
David Ensor, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
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