WASHINGTON Ñ The U.S. Defense Department has recruited the
intelligence agencies to track assistance to Al Qaida from Middle Eastern and Persian Gulf
states.
U.S. diplomats and intelligence agents have been
monitoring some 30 countries in the Middle East, Africa and Asia, defense officials said. The
objective is to monitor Al Qaida insurgents who
escaped from Afghanistan and have regrouped in other countries, the officials said.
Some of the countries where Al Qaida operatives are said to be
regrouping include Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, the Philippines, Somalia, Syria and
Yemen. The officials said the Palestinian Authority is also being monitored, Middle East Newsline reported.
Defense officials said some of these countries may be
harboring Al Qaida sleeper agents who could be activated later this year in
attacks on U.S. military and diplomatic installations in the region.
Last week, U.S. Air Force Brig. Gen. John W. Rosa Jr., deputy director
for operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, termed Yemen as a refuge for
Al Qaida agents who fled Afghanistan. Rosa said Yemen has already arrested
Al Qaida fugitives.
Other countries such as Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Sudan and the
United Arab Emirates are also said to contain the seeds of Al Qaida
strongholds. But the officials said Washington has a brisk security and
defense relationship with these countries.
"What I worry about the most, to be perfectly honest," Defense Secretary
Donald Rumsfeld said, "is the connection or relationship or nexus between
states that are terrorist states and have weapons of mass destruction and
terrorist organizations like Al Qaida and the risk that we face in the
period ahead that terrorist organizations that are willing to kill thousands
of innocent people could have access to weapons of mass destruction and
develop a capability to kill not thousands but tens of thousands or hundreds
of thousands."
Officials acknowledged that U.S. military personnel have entered such
areas as northern Iraq to determine whether Al Qaida has regrouped near the
Turkish border. They also said U.S. warships have increased reconnaissance
and inspections of ships in the Persian Gulf, the Red Sea and the
Mediterranean.
"We do not have forces in Iraq if you're thinking of large numbers,"
Rumsfeld said. "From time to time Americans do go into Iraq to visit with
the Kurds, to look at the situation. People from various agencies and
departments of the government go in there."
