- WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A suspect in the bombing of the U.S. embassy in Nairobi
has given details of a global paramilitary network aimed at U.S. interests
abroad and orchestrated by Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden, the Washington
Post reported on Wednesday.
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- The newspaper quoted from notes taken
by Pakistani intelligence officials who spent a week questioning the man,
whom U.S. authorities have identified as Mohammed Saddiq Odeh.
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- Odeh was detained in Pakistan where he
had flown from Kenya on the day of the bombing. He was later sent back
to Kenya for further questioning.
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- The New York Times on Wednesday quoted
unnamed Pakistani officials in Islamabad as saying two more suspects in
the Nairobi bombing had been arrested while trying to cross into neighboring
Afghanistan.
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- The officials said they had been led
to the two men by infromation provided by Odeh. One was a Sudanese and
the other a Saudi and both were traveling on Yemeni passports, the officials
said.
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- The Washington Post reported Odeh had
told Pakistani officials that his network was financed and run by bin Laden,
a wealthy Afghanistan-based Saudi who is believed to be funding violent
Islamic groups.
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- According to the notes, Odeh told Pakistani
officials that bin Laden controls some 4,000 to 5,000 militants from a
number of Muslim countries, some of whom were sent as operatives to take
part in armed actions abroad.
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- Odeh told Pakistani interrogators that
bin Laden had a large arsenal of surface-to-air missiles, mortars, rockets
and tanks that are stored all over Afghanistan, according to the Post report.
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- Kenyan and U.S. investigators said on
Monday that Odeh had not admitted any responsibility in the Nairobi bombing
or an almost simultaneous one at the U.S. embassy in Dar es Salaam.
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- At least 257 people were killed and more
than 5,000 injured in the car bomb attacks on Aug. 7.
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- The Post reported that Odeh told the
Pakistani officials he was an engineer who had been sent to Kenya to provide
technical and logistical support for the bombing, but that he had been
instructed to leave Kenya hours before the blast.
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- The newspaper quoted the officials as
saying they were not surprised Odeh had not repeated his story to U.S.
and Kenyan investigators.
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- He was "fully aware that his on-the-record
admission of anti-U.S. guerrilla operations would take him to the gallows",
one official told the paper.
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- While in Pakistan, the officials said,
Odeh had sought to gain the sympathy of his captors, who were fellow Muslims.
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- Pakistani officials have identified Odeh
as a 34-year-old Palestinian from Jordan.
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- In Nairobi, the Nation newspaper reported
on Wednesday that FBI agents had raided a Kenyan hotel where the bomb that
targeted the U.S. embassy was made and confiscated evidence.
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- The Nation said the agents were tipped
about the hotel by Odeh, who had confessed to taking part in the bombing.
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