DUBAI - The Arabic al Jazeera television station says it has received a statement from ousted Taleban leader Mullah Omar in which he vows his group will not rest until it ousts United States forces from Afghanistan.
"God willing the rule of [Islamic] sharia will return to Afghanistan and the believers will bask in God's victory," the statement is reported as saying.
The Qatar-based station is noted for broadcasting videotaped statements by Osama bin Laden.
Omar accused America of being an "advocate of international terrorism".
An al Jazeera official said the statement, which was faxed to the station, appeared to be genuine.
America accuses bin Laden of masterminding last year's September 11 attacks and the Taleban of sheltering him and his men. An 11-month US-led campaign in Afghanistan ousted the Taleban but failed to catch bin Laden or Omar.
US-backed Afghan President Hamid Karzai, who blames remnants of the Taleban militia for attempting to kill him last week, believes Omar is still alive.
The statement said America was "simple-minded and arrogant. Strong with its warplanes, bombs and equipment but weak in its content. It claims to be the mother of freedom [and] justice, while it practises the worst forms of oppression and enslavement."
It said "the weak have rejoiced" after the September 11 attacks because of "US injustice ... in Palestine, Iraq, Sudan, Kashmir, Afghanistan and all Muslim countries".
Omar said the United States had planned to attack Afghanistan before September 11 as part of an attack on Islam.
"It wanted to destroy the Muslim system and to prevent the implementation of sharia and the revival of the Islamic religion of which it is scared."
Al Jazeera also aired an interview with a man it identified as a member of al Qaeda who confirmed that Osama bin Laden was the man who appeared in a controversial tape released by the Pentagon in December as evidence of the Saudi-born militant's guilt in the deadly attacks on US cities.
In the tape bin Laden is seen chatting informally with fellow-militants and saying he had been more optimistic than his colleagues about how much damage the attacks would inflict.
The tape was met with scepticism among Arabs and Muslims but US officials at the time said they believed the tape was authentic.
The station also broadcast remarks by Khaled Sheikh Mohammad, who it described as al Qaeda's military operations chief.
"We started to plan for the raids of Washington and New York two years and a half before [them]. When we started to study the targets the idea of hitting US nuclear facilities emerged."
- REUTERS
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