3.00pm - By ANDREW BUNCOMBE
The United States has never quite dared believe it could decapitate al Qaeda and neutralise the men who masterminded the 11 September attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon.
But as evidence emerges about an extraordinary series of police raids and a bloody shoot-out at a high-class residential compound in Karachi last week, it seems its wish might just have been granted.
Information from American and Pakistani sources over the weekend suggested that Ramzi bin al-Shibh, the 30-year-old Yemeni considered to be the big catch of last week's raids, could be not only the central figure in the 11 September plot but also the next Osama bin Laden.
He may be emerging as the leader of the newly configured al Qaeda after the group's expulsion from Afghanistan, the death of thousands of its cohorts, possibly including Mr bin Laden, and the arrests of several hundred others.
There is more. Aside from bin al-Shibh, who is believed to be either in Pakistani or US custody and subject to intense interrogation, there is furious speculation about the fate of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, a close associate who boasted in an interview last week that he was the military commander of al Qaeda and the man who first thought of flying commercial airliners into prominent US buildings.
Conflicting, unofficial reports suggest that Mohammed was either taken into custody with bin al-Shibh, or that he was one of two al Qaeda suspects who died in a three-hour gun battle with Pakistani police last Wednesday, the anniversary of the September 11 attacks.
American officials, acknowledging only the capture of bin al-Shibh, have said that the significance of his capture cannot be overstated. Prosecutors in Germany and America have already described him as the main surviving member of the Hamburg cell led by Mohammed Atta, the pilot of the first plane to slam into the World Trade Centre.
Bin al-Shibh was also meant to be part of the suicide-hijacking team, according to prosecution documents, but was denied a US visa on four occasions. Instead, he allegedly played the leading role in coordinating the other 19 hijackers, acting as logistics chief and financier for the operation.
Evidence garnered from other captured al Qaeda fighters, including hero-worship style photographs found in their belongings, suggests bin al-Shibh has since enjoyed cult status in the movement and may have played a pivotal role in subsequent al Qaeda assaults, including a recent bombing in Tunisia.
Mohammed, meanwhile, was identified by American officials a few months ago as the conceptual mastermind behind the September 11 attacks. He has been wanted since 1995, when he is believed to have conspired with his nephew, Ramzi Yousef, to blow up a dozen airliners over the Pacific Ocean. Yousef, who is currently serving a life sentence in the US, was also involved in the first attempt to blow up the World Trade Centre in 1993.
Evidence that Mohammed and bin al-Shibh had become central figures in al Qaeda emerged in an interview they gave to the Arab satellite television station Al-Jazeera in June.
In the interview, which was aired last week, they bragged about the two and a half years it took to plan the September 11 attacks, calling it "Holy Tuesday", giving themselves lavish credit and revealing several new details about it. They said they had considered flying a plane into a nuclear reactor but discarded the idea, fearing the operation would "go out of control".
They said the fourth plane, which crashed in Pennsylvania after an apparent revolt by the passengers, was heading to the US Capitol building rather than the White House, as another senior al Qaeda leader in US custody, Abu Zubeida, suggested a few months ago.
Perhaps most significantly, Mohammed made one reference to Osama bin Laden in the past tense, bolstering the view that the founding leader of al Qaeda is now out of the picture and very possibly dead.
The Al-Jazeera interviewer, Yosri Fouda, was given only audiotapes of his interview, not video the result, possibly, of a security lapse when Mr Mohammed realised he had a mobile phone with him.
One way or another, communications intelligence appears to have been crucial to locating Mohammed and bin al-Shibh.
Spanish police found a telephone number for him in April while arresting the suspected financial chief of al Qaeda in Spain. Reports over the weekend suggest that the Pakistanis were led to the Karachi compound after the interception of a phone call that had been made by bin al-Shibh.
Details of the police raid remain sketchy and contradictory but, according to the most complete account in yesterday's Washington Post newspaper there were at least three separate raids between last Tuesday night and Wednesday morning. Bin al-Shibh was found asleep and seized without incident. After that, six Arabic-speaking men and one woman were captured, also without any resistance.
However, as the police began escorting them down a staircase, a man armed with an automatic weapon possibly Mohammed lobbed a grenade at them from the doorway of another flat. The police beat a retreat, losing control of some detainees in the chaos.
A furious battle erupted, pitting up to 200 law enforcement officials against the small band of resisters, who barricaded themselves on the roof of the compound. Two suspects were found dead, including the one who had thrown the grenade, and a dozen others were captured.
Police searching the grenade-attackers' apartment found the Islamic statement of belief ("There is no God but God, and Allah is the prophet of God") daubed on a wall in human blood.
It is not clear what will happen next to bin al-Shibh. Pakistan's Interior Minister, Moinuddin Haider, said yesterday that he was still in Pakistani custody. Other Pakistani officials suggested that he would be quickly handed over to the Americans.
The German government also has an international arrest warrant out against him but said yesterday that the American claim took precedence.
- INDEPENDENT
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