Al-Qaeda chief Osama Bin Laden had planned to hijack American planes travelling across Southeast Asia and crash them into U.S. military facilities in the region in coordination with 9/11 attacks, according to a secret interrogation report of one of his bodyguards.
Abd al-Malik Abd al-Wahab, a Yemen national, was arrested by Pakistani forces on December 15, 2001 while attempting to cross the Afghanistan-Pakistan border near Parachinar in Pakistan after fleeing from Osama's Tora Bora mountain complex. In December, U.S. forces had bombed the region after getting reports that Osama was hiding there. He, however, escaped the onslaught.
“Detainee was captured with a group of 31 other Arab Al-Qaeda fighters referred to by US intelligence reporting as the ‘Dirty 30', most of whom are assessed to be UBL [Osama] bodyguards and other members of UBL's security detail,” said the report published by WikiLeaks.
The report, signed by a Rear Admiral on April 28, 2008, says that al-Wahab was related, by marriage to Osama. It, however, did not elaborate.
Recommending continued detention, the report said: “Detainee received specialised terrorist training and was designated to be a suicide operative in an al-Qaeda plot to hijack airplanes in Southeast Asia.” “Detainee trained for an aborted al-Qaida operation in Southeast Asia to hijack US airliners and crash them into US military facilities in Asia in coordination with 11 September 2001.
“In 1999, detainee and several other Al-Qaeda members were designated as suicide operatives in a plot to hijack US air carriers travelling across Southeast Asia and destroy them in midair. These attacks were originally intended to occur simultaneously with those in the US on 11 September 2001.”
It said Osama later cancelled the operation due to the difficulty involved in synchronising the attacks.
According to another detenu, Osama planned to use Yemenis and Saudis who could not obtain a U.S. visa for the Asian portion of the plot because they could easily travel to Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore, Hong Kong, the Philippines, and South Korea.
Published - April 30, 2011 01:25 am IST
