Haaretz : Intercepted call from Pakistan prompted UK arrests in terror plot

Intercepted call from Pakistan prompted UK arrests in terror plot

from Haaretz.com | by The Associated Press | August 12, 2006

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - An intercept of a telephone call made from Pakistan to Britain that urged plotters to go ahead with attacks on U.S.-bound jetliners played a crucial role in foiling the alleged terror plan, Pakistani officials said Saturday.

The arrest in Pakistan of a key suspect with alleged Al-Qaida links, British national Rashid Rauf, prompted an unidentified associate of his to make the call from Karachi to one of the suspects subsequently arrested in Britain, the officials said.

"This telephone call intercept in Karachi and the arrest of Rashid Rauf helped a lot to foil the terror plan," a senior Pakistani security official said on condition of anonymity.

It wasn't clear exactly when the call was intercepted, but officials have said Rauf - one of at least two Britons of Pakistani descent arrested here - was nabbed about a week before the plot was busted in Britain on Thursday.

British security agency's informer in Pakistan with contacts with Rauf provided a tip that helped Pakistan arrest him, a Pakistani intelligence official also speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive subject matter.

A U.S. official disclosed, on condition of anonymity, that after the first arrests in Pakistan, word went from Pakistan to the London plotters to move ahead quickly, a message intercepted by an intelligence agency. That prompted British police to move in on the conspirators, long under watch.

The plotters allegedly planned to blow up as many as 10 jetliners flying to the United States from Britain. Pakistan says it played an "important role" in breaking the conspiracy in cooperation with British and U.S. agents.

Pakistan's government has confirmed the arrests of seven suspects here, and intelligence officials say 10 other people were detained Friday and were being questioned Saturday to determine their links to the alleged plot and where they had received financial support or any training.

An intelligence official familiar with the investigation confirmed the communication intercept, and said British agents had been monitoring the activities of Rauf's family since December. The official said one of the suspects caught in Britain and named by British authorities, Tayib Rauf, is a close relative of Rashid Rauf.

The man who made the call was "inexperienced" and he "alerted his associates about the arrest of Rashid Rauf, and asked them to go ahead" with the attacks, said the intelligence official, without confirming who the caller was and whether he too had been caught.

But the intelligence official said most men linked to the plot in Pakistan had been arrested, and only two or three suspects were still at large.

He said among them was Matiur Rahman, a senior figure in the Al-Qaida-linked Pakistani militant group, Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, whose name was mentioned by one of the detainees during interrogation. His possible role remains unclear.

Authorities in Pakistan have sought Rahman in connection with sectarian attacks on minority Shiite Muslims in Pakistan, in two failed attempts on the life of Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf in December 2003, and attacks in Karachi against Westerners, the official said. Rahman is believed to have met with some Al-Qaida operatives in recent years, he added.

Interior Minister Aftab Khan Sherpao on Saturday refused to share any information about Rahman's possible links to the failed London terror plot.

Pakistan government in a statement Friday described Rashid Rauf as a "key person" in the plot. It said there were "indications of Afghanistan-based Al-Qaida connection" in the case, but it did not give supporting evidence.

U.S. and Pakistani officials have not yet approached Afghan authorities on a possible link with al-Qaida in Afghanistan, said Afghan Foreign Ministry spokesman Sultan Ahmed Baheen.

He said the government did not think it was necessary to investigate inside Afghanistan although it would cooperate if asked by the United States or Pakistan - its eastern neighbor which it accuses of harboring Taliban rebels.

"The source of terrorism is outside the country, and this means the international community and our neighbors, particularly Pakistan, should do more against terrorism," Baheen said.

Pakistan is a key ally of Britain and the U.S. in the war on terrorism and renounced its ties with the Taliban after the Sept. 11 attacks on America. In the past five years, it has captured hundreds of Al-Qaida fighters and arrested key figures in Osama bin Laden's terror network, but it remains of a hotbed for Islamic radicals.

Three of the four suicide attackers in the July 7, 2005, bombings on the London transport system that killed 52 people were British Muslims of Pakistani origin and had visited Pakistan before the attacks.