GCHQ Knew bin Laden's Plan Since 1995
DIE WELT/AFP/BBC | 24.05.2002 09:07
Western Intel Knew bin Laden's
Plan Since 1995 - German Paper
BBC
5-21-2
BERLIN (AFP) - Western secret services knew as far back as 1995 that suspected terror mastermind Osama bin Laden planned to attack civilian sites using commercial passenger planes, German newspaper Die Welt said Friday.
Quoting sources close to western intelligence services, Die Welt said that authorities did not take seriously the threat of the plan, known as Project Bojinka.
The plan was discovered in January 1995 by Philippine police who were investigating a possible attack against Pope John Paul II on a visit to Manila.
They found details of the plan in a computer seized in an apartment used by three men who were part of Bin Laden's al-Qaeda network.
It provided for 11 planes to be exploded simultaneously by bombs placed on board, but also in an alternative form for several planes flying to the United States to be hijacked and flown into civilian targets.
Among targets mentioned was the World Trade Center in New York, which was destroyed in the September 11 terror attacks in the United States that killed thousands.
Other targets mentioned were CIA offices in Virginia and the Sears Tower in Chicago, Die Welt said.
The plot re-surfaced during the trial in New York in 1997 of Pakistani Ramsi Youssef, the mastermind of the attack on the World Trade Center in 1993.
Die Welt said the US Federal Bureau of Investigation and CIA would have known about the plan at the latest at this time.
Plan Since 1995 - German Paper
BBC
5-21-2
BERLIN (AFP) - Western secret services knew as far back as 1995 that suspected terror mastermind Osama bin Laden planned to attack civilian sites using commercial passenger planes, German newspaper Die Welt said Friday.
Quoting sources close to western intelligence services, Die Welt said that authorities did not take seriously the threat of the plan, known as Project Bojinka.
The plan was discovered in January 1995 by Philippine police who were investigating a possible attack against Pope John Paul II on a visit to Manila.
They found details of the plan in a computer seized in an apartment used by three men who were part of Bin Laden's al-Qaeda network.
It provided for 11 planes to be exploded simultaneously by bombs placed on board, but also in an alternative form for several planes flying to the United States to be hijacked and flown into civilian targets.
Among targets mentioned was the World Trade Center in New York, which was destroyed in the September 11 terror attacks in the United States that killed thousands.
Other targets mentioned were CIA offices in Virginia and the Sears Tower in Chicago, Die Welt said.
The plot re-surfaced during the trial in New York in 1997 of Pakistani Ramsi Youssef, the mastermind of the attack on the World Trade Center in 1993.
Die Welt said the US Federal Bureau of Investigation and CIA would have known about the plan at the latest at this time.
DIE WELT/AFP/BBC