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Bin Laden called himself a "prophet"
A Pakistani millionaire held at the U.S. prison in Guantanamo Bay testified that he met Osama bin Laden twice, and the al-Qaida leader called himself "a prophet."The testimony of Saifullah A. Paracha was included in thousands of pages of transcripts released Friday by the Pentagon because of a successful Freedom of Information Act lawsuit by The Associated Press. The material was also released last year in a U.S. case against his son. Paracha, a New York Institute of Technology graduate, testified in English. He said he owns seven businesses, including a news agency, a construction agency and a manufacturing company in Pakistan and travel agencies in New York, Chicago, Washington and San Francisco. In 1999, Paracha said, he met bin Laden in Afghanistan. The following year, he returned to Afghanistan to interview bin Laden for his news agency, Universal Broadcast Ltd. "He delivered (preached) the Quran, and said he was a prophet," Paracha said. "He said very nice things, very impressive." But Paracha denied all the accusations raised in the January 2005 tribunal, conducted to determine whether he was properly classified as an "enemy combatant." Those accusations included money laundering for al-Qaida, plotting to smuggle explosives into the United States and recommending that nuclear weapons be used against U.S. soldiers. Paracha's son, Uzair Paracha, facing up to 75 years in prison after his November conviction in New York for providing material support to terrorists, was arrested in May 2003. Posted by: Dan Darling 2006-03-05 |
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