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| Afghanistan/South Asia |
| Aziz attack was Dire Revenge for Ghailani arrest |
| 2004-08-02 |
| The attempt to kill Pakistan's prime minister-designate could be retaliation for the capture of a key Al Qaeda suspect in the deadly 1998 bombing of two US embassies in east Africa, a minister said yesterday. Friday's assassination attempt on Shaukat Aziz could be in "retaliation" to the arrest of Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani, a Tanzanian Al Qaeda suspect on the FBI's most-wanted list, Information Minister Sheikh Rashid said. "Ghailani was a big catch as he had trained many militants for suicide bombings," the minister said. A militant group calling itself "Al Islambouli Brigades, Al Qaeda organisation" posted a statement on an Islamist website claiming responsibility for the attack. The attack was a response to Musharraf's handover of Islamist militants to the United States, it said. The purported group is named after Khaled Al Islambouli, an army officer who assassinated Egyptian president Anwar Sadat during a military parade in 1981. The statement went on to threaten more "painful strikes" if Pakistani leaders did "not stop taking orders from the despicable US President George W Bush". "This is for the first time Al Qaeda has claimed the responsibility and its authenticity needs to be examined," Rashid said. "Al Qaeda had not even claimed the responsibility for the attempt on President Pervez Musharraf in December, why they have now come out with such a statement? Terrorists are creating terror in different parts of Pakistan, but we will continue to play our positive role in the international war against terrorism." "Pakistani security agencies have arrested several wanted militants and they must be getting frustrated and in retaliation attacking security and government officials," Rashid added. Ghailani who was hiding with four men, three women including his Uzbek wife, and six children in a house in Gujrat, 160km southeast of Islamabad was caught after an eight-hour shootout last month. |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |