- WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Top
U.S. officials said on Sunday authorities were investigating but had found
no evidence to link a string of deadly sniper attacks in the Washington
area to international terror groups.
-
- Secretary of State Colin Powell, appearing on "Fox
News Sunday," said it was conceivable but unproven that the attacks
were connected to the al Qaeda organization of Saudi-born militant Osama
bin Laden, which the United States has blamed for last year's Sept. 11
attacks on New York and Washington.
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- "Obviously, it's conceivable, but I have seen no
evidence to tie this terrible series of attacks in the Washington area
to al Qaeda," Powell said. "We're looking for every possible
connection, but so far I've not seen anything that does tie it to al Qaeda."
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- Powell and other officials spoke following what appeared
to be a 12th attack by the gunman who has encircled the nation's capital
since Oct. 2 with random shootings that have killed nine people and injured
two.
-
- A shooting on Saturday night in Ashland, Virginia, prompted
another massive manhunt and dragnet of highways. Hundreds of local, state
and federal officials are pursuing the killer, who appears to pick victims
at random and has struck in Washington and neighboring suburbs in Maryland
and Virginia.
-
- President Bush's national security adviser, Condoleezza
Rice, told CBS' "Face the Nation" officials were vigorously looking
for a link between the sniper and terror groups but had found none.
-
- "There's no evidence to this point that this is
the work of an international terrorist organization," Rice said. "We
are of course keeping open that possibility and we're going to turn over
every rock to see if it might in fact be."
-
- "But there is no evidence at this point that this
is internationally driven in any way," Rice said.
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- Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle told the Fox program
he was frustrated by the case and suggested the FBI and federal authorities
do more to help solve it.
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- "Whether or not it's international, it is terror,"
the South Dakota Democrat said. "It is striking at the hearts and
minds of people in this whole area, changing the way we live and the way
we act and the way we think."
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- "We need to meld forces here and do all that we
can to ... apprehend this criminal," Daschle said. "It is not
only a concern for our children and our families and the way we live, but
a frustration about our inability, with all the resources we have in law
enforcement, not to be able to ... find him."
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