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Personal Documentation Not New for Osama bin Laden

Aired August 19, 2002 - 14:22   ET

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

CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: And continuing now with a CNN exclusive, what we have seen of the al Qaeda terror tapes suggests strongly that Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda were testing some form of deadly gas, but what are the wider indications?
CNN Terrorism Analyst Peter Bergen has seen the tapes, and he joins us now with some insights on what these tapes might mean. One of the tapes that I thought was fascinating we didn't get a chance to talk about with Nic Robertson, was the video of Osama bin Laden back in 1998 surrounded by his security detail, someone compared it to the complexity of the security detail around the president of the United States.

PETER BERGEN, CNN TERRORISM ANALYST: Well, bin Laden is pretty interested in his own security. I mean, he was the subject of assassination attempts by the Saudis even in the mid-90s. So, for instance, when we interviewed him -- CNN interviewed him in '97, he had roughly the same level -- at least in terms of numbers of security that we see in the '98 videotape. I mean, we are talking about -- I counted 30 people in the evening -- in the course of an evening that we met with bin Laden who were protecting him. Now, the '98 videotape, obviously, I think, there is a certain amount of playing it up for the camera in a sense that some of these -- bin Laden understood he was being filmed, he was meeting -- this is in the context of meeting with a number of Pakistani journalists. I don't think bin Laden travels like this all the time, but he certainly does travel with a lot of security, it may not be exactly like this, but he has been very conscious of his security since the mid-90s.

LIN: The chemical testing that you saw in the videotape today -- now that you have seen the actual testing by al Qaeda, can you relate it to any recent events that suggest that al Qaeda is on the move?

BERGEN: Well, we know from court testimony that al Qaeda was developing these weapons, now we see it on the videotape, but there is potentially a link between the tests and actually sort of real events. In February, four Moroccans were arrested in Rome, allegedly planning to introduce a cyanide-like compound into the water supply of U.S. embassy in Rome. So, that -- that allegation suggests that al Qaeda was perhaps putting some these efforts looking into cyanide into practice.

LIN: What do you make of these videotapes stockpiled in this house in Afghanistan? Do you think they were part of Osama bin Laden's personal library, or where they just left behind by his operatives? BERGEN: It is hard to tell exactly, but I tell you, bin Laden has been very interested in his sort of public image for a long time. As early as 1987, an Egyptian journalist called Hissam Duraz (ph) started documenting bin Laden and his men. So this is not something entirely new for bin Laden to have documented -- obviously, as time went on, it became more sophisticated. But bin Laden had a media adviser, and a media committee, and it was run by somebody called Abu Router (ph), so it is something that he has paid a lot of attention to.

LIN: And obviously getting a lot of air time these days around the world. Thank you very much, Peter Bergen.

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