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| Tuesday, 6 January 2004 |
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Bin Laden tape appearing to refer to Saddam capture DUBAI, Monday (AFP) Qatar-based Al-Jazeera television night aired an audiotape attributed to Osama bin Laden in which he appeared to refer to the December 13 capture of Saddam Hussein and at least one other recent development. Gulf leaders "know that their turn is coming" after seeing "the capture of their former comrade in treason and collaboration with America," the speaker purported to be the Al-Qaeda terror chief said. The reference to the capture of the ousted Iraqi leader "shows that the tape was recently recorded," Al-Jazeera's news anchor said. Listing US-led "conspiracies" against the Islamic nation, the voice also referred to the "Geneva peace initiative", an unofficial Israeli-Palestinian peace plan which was officially unveiled in the Swiss city on December 1. The man said to be bin Laden also spoke of the triple suicide bombings last May in Riyadh, citing "the Riyadh bombings in Rabih al-Awal this year" - the date according to the Muslim calendar. Another suicide bombing rocked a residential compound in the Saudi capital in November. The man said to be bin Laden lashed out at Gulf Arab rulers for cooperating with the United States and charged that Saudi leaders had launched their crackdown on Islamist militants "before the Riyadh bombings in Rabih al-Awal this year." They had done so at Washington's behest "in the hope of winning its approval," the voice said. In the new tape, the speaker said to be bin Laden warned that unless the United States was stopped, it would go on occupying Saudi Arabia and the entire oil-rich Gulf region after Iraq. "There can be no dialogue with the occupiers except with weapons," the speaker said. He urged Muslims to resort to jihad, or holy war, to "repel the huge conspiracies woven against our nation" - from "the crusaders' occupation of Baghdad using the weapons of mass destruction deceit ... to the fierce attempt to crush the jihad and the mujahedeen in beloved Palestine using the deceit of the roadmap and the Geneva peace initiative." The United States was feverishly going after "those who raise the banner of jihad under the guise of fighting terrorism, with the help of the hypocrites, because they all know that jihad is the potent force that can thwart all plots," the speaker said. |
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