Ayman al Zawahiri a leader of Egyptian Islamic Jihad went on to become number two to Usama bin Laden and a creator of Al Qaida...
The CPA nevertheless marks the first time that the United States and Britain have endorsed a government which seized power by force then harboured and cooperated with anti-Western Islamist terrorists including Usama bin Laden and is now accelerating what Washington has termed 'genocide'...
The USA accuses IARA of having been 'affiliated with the 'Maktab al Khidamat' the 'Services Office' and 'precursor' of Al Qaida; of having 'commingled funds and cooperated closely in the raising and expenditure of funds' with Usama bin Laden and MK; and even of assessing Mali as a possible haven for UBL...
Far from using the leadup to the trip to pressure the National Islamic Front over its Darfur genocide like Kofi Annan and Colin Powell (both witnessed the suffering in Darfur) London refused until the last minute to acknowledge the visit was happening 'for security reasons' an odd concern for people visiting the former hosts of Usama bin Laden...
A son of a High Court judge a convert to Islam and an admirer of both Usama bin Laden and Nelson Mandela Alhaji Asari is a central figure in the web...
A partying fundamentalist The town is controlled by Alhaji Dokubo-Asari who converted to Islam as a student some 20 years ago claims Usama bin Laden as a hero proclaims himself a fundamentalist but also parties with the best of them...
Vol 45 No 1 |
- EAST AFRICA
The fact that the NIF regime has hosted Usama bin Laden and several Al Qaida-linked Islamist 'charities' in Khartoum will be cited as an indicator of the significance of the peace accord...
Usama bin Laden's Al Qaida network could be preparing to attack Western targets in Africa for a third time a panel of experts warned the United Nations Security Council last week...
Most recently his success at rounding up an Islamist cell linked to Usama bin Laden's Al Qaida which had identified targets including shipping in the strategically sensitive Strait of Gibraltar won him extra credits with the Palace...
Since the Machakos talks began in June 2002 it has got away with: presenting the war as the only issue; making people think a lasting peace can be established without democracy or human rights; massacring civilians to clear oil areas in Upper Nile; air bombardment of civilians in Darfur; getting rid of the effective United Nations Human Rights Special Rapporteur Gerhart Baum; building the Western Upper Nile oil road it had agreed under Machakos to halt; convincing foreigners it wants only power and money not an Islamist revolution; convincing outsiders it alone represents Sudan Sudanese and Islam; convincing people its 'project' has failed so peace is inevitable; convincing Westerners and Arabs that what Hassan el Turabi stands for is no longer NIF policy; making people forget it that it had offered the south self-determination (even secession: infisal) in 1989 and the 1997 Khartoum Peace Accord (in February 2003 Britain's then Development Secretary Clare Short called it a 'breakthrough'); transforming the debate about secular Sudan into one about the capital or part of it; establishing moral equivalence at Machakos with the far less powerful Sudan People's Liberation Army/Movement; taking over the economy in the guise of privatisation: we hear hundreds of NIF companies are moving to Indonesia and Malaysia; convincing the International Monetary Fund and World Bank it's broke when it has the oil-money it needs for military expenditure; the Bank's Ishaq Diwan enthuses about a post-war 'quick impact programme'; giving the impression it was reluctant host to Usama bin Laden and Al Qaida not part of the same Islamist strategy; making gestures of anti-terrorist cooperation; confirming Egypt's belief that an independent south threatens the Nile; convincing the Arab world the Sudan war is against Arabism and Islam...
