Jill St Claire's HomelandSecurityUS.NET

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Peshawar, June 22: The bitter winter winds were howling through the Afghan mountains when, cameraman Qari Mohammed Yusuf says, a courier brought a summons from al-Qaeda’s no. 2: "the Emir wants to send a message."

The Emir, meaning prince or commander, was Osama Bin Laden`s deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri. He wanted to send a message to the world that he had safely survived a US attempt to kill him.

So Yusuf, following the courier`s directions, says he traveled to al-Zawahri`s Afghan hide-out last January and shot the tape that would become another contribution to al-Qaeda’s propaganda battles that are a critical component of its terror campaign.

Al-Zawahri was wearing crisp white robes and turban. "Everything was ready," the cameraman, a dark-skinned man in his mid-30s with a long, scruffy beard, recalled in an interview with a news agency.

"There was just myself and the Emir," said Yusuf. "I used a small Sony camera. It lasted just half an hour. They chose the place. They fix it and then they just say to me to come, and my job is only to record it. These are their rules, and no one asks any questions."

The video aired on al-Jazeera, the Arabic TV network, on January 30, less than three weeks after the US airstrike on a building just across the border in eastern Pakistan that targeted al-Zawahri but instead killed 13 villagers. Pakistan said four al-Qaeda militants were also killed in the attack, but their identities were never proven.

Bureau Report

SAN DIEGO -- Federal teams arrested more than 400 illegal immigrants in San Diego as part of a nationwide operation announced Wednesday. California topped the list of states included in the sweep, with 722 arrests including 81 arrested in San Francisco and 47 in Los Angeles. Nationwide, agents from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement picked up more than 2,100 fugitive criminals, gang members, and illegal immigrants in the two-week sweep. In San Diego, officers arrested 402 people in late-night and early morning raids starting May 30, according to ICE spokeswoman Lauren Mack.

"This is unprecedented operation in terms of the number of people they encountered and arrested," Mack said.

All those arrested in San Diego were Mexican or Guatemalan nationals and were deported to their home countries, she said. They included 166 with criminal records, several for sex crimes against children, she said. One of the people arrested, Mexican national Martin Castro-Liera, 41, was convicted in 2003 for molesting a teenage niece. Arrested June 5, it was his third deportation in 18 months, Mack said.

Nationally, more than half of the 2,179 people who were arrested in the operation, dubbed "Return to Sender," had criminal records for crimes including sexual assault, drug trafficking, robbery and abduction, according to Julie Myers, assistant secretary for ICE. More than 360 were members or associates of violent gangs, including the notorious Mara Salvatrucha, or MS-13, she said. San Diego had the most arrests of any city in part because officers arrested illegal immigrants they encountered during raids whether or not they were on the target list, Mack said. Two were arrested after they rear-ended an ICE vehicle during the operation in an accident unrelated to any raid. There are more than 5,400 people currently facing deportation orders in San Diego, Mack said.

KABUL, June 10 (Reuters) - Canadian and Afghan troops killed more than 30 Taliban fighters in the southern Afghan province of Zabul on June 5, the U.S.-led military coalition said in a statement on Saturday. A joint force engaged over 60 insurgents in the Arghandab district of Zabul. Neither the Afghan or Canadian troops, who are serving with the coalition, suffered any casualties, the statement said. An insurgency raging since U.S.-backed forces ousted a Taliban government in late 2001 is going through its bloodiest phase, with 400 people, mostly militants, killed in May alone.

Ben Laden is 000000000000 the revenge of the prince blood the fighting sheikh the martyr Abu Mosaab from all of the conspirators 0000 the green light is everywhere 000 Qm of brother 000 Qm of brother is Palestine militants Iraq militants are militants in the Arabian Peninsula

     The following is the text of the audio message attributed to Al Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden and released on the Internet on Tuesday. The transcript was run by the As Sahab Website, one of the outlets used by the terror network, under the headline "A Testimony to the Truth".

    "From Usama bin Muhammad bin Ladin to the American people: peace be upon he who has followed the Guidance.

    "This is a brief message whose topic is my testimony on behalf of the Muslim prisoners you are holding, and in it I will talk about the truth concerning them, which is something which the Bush administration hates and is hostile to.

    "I begin by talking about the honorable brother Zacarias Moussaoui. The truth is that he has no connection whatsoever with the events of September 11th, and I am certain of what I say, because I was responsible for entrusting the 19 brothers - Allah have mercy upon them - with those raids, and I did not assign brother Zacarias to be with them on that mission.

    "And his confession that he was assigned to participate in those raids is a false confession which no intelligent person doubts is a result of the pressure put upon him for the past four and a half years.

    "And were this pressure lifted from him for him to return to his normal state, he would state the fact I mentioned. And among the things that confirm this fact is that the participants in September 11th were two groups: pilots and support teams for each pilot in order to control the aircraft.

    "And since Zacarias Moussaoui was learning how to fly, it follows that he wasn't component number 20 from the teams which helped to control the airplanes, as your government previously claimed, and your government knows this fact with certainty.

    "And if Moussaoui was studying aviation to become a pilot of one of the planes, then let him tell us the names of those assigned to help him control the plane.

    "But he won't be able to tell us their names, for a simple reason: that in fact they don't exist. This is from one perspective, and from another perspective, the brother Moussaoui was arrested two weeks before the events, and had he known anything - however little - about the September 11th group, we would have told the brother Commander Mohamed Atta and his brothers - Allah have mercy upon them - to leave America immediately before their affair was exposed.

    "And with this it becomes clear to even the novice investigator, not to mention the seasoned one, that there is no connection between him and the events of September 11th.

    "And then I call to memory my brothers the prisoners in Guantanamo - may Allah free them all - and I state the fact, about which I also am certain, that all the prisoners of Guantanamo, who were captured in 2001 and the first half of 2002 and who number in the hundreds, have no connection whatsoever to the events of September 11th, and even stranger is that many of them have no connection with Al Qaeda in the first place, and even more amazing is that some of them oppose Al Qaeda's methodology of calling for war with America.

    "And this is in addition to the arrest of those who were working in the relief agencies, like Abu Abdul Aziz Al Mutrafi, or those working in the media, like Sami Al Hajj and Taysir Alouni, who was imprisoned at the instigation of the American administration.

    "So the conclusion is that all the prisoners to date have no connection with the events of September 11th and knew nothing about them, with the exception of two of the brothers, may Allah free them all.

    "Bush and his administration are aware of this fact, but they avoid mentioning it, for reasons not hidden to the discerning. Among these reasons is that it is necessary to create justifications for the massive spending of hundreds of billions on the Defense Department and other agencies in their war against the Mujahideen.

    "My mentioning of these facts isn't out of hope that Bush and his party will treat our brothers fairly in their cases, because that is something no rational person expects, but rather it is meant to expose the oppression, injustice and arbitrariness of your administration in using force and the reactions that result from that.

    "This is from one perspective, and from another perspective, perhaps there will one day come from the Americans someone who desires justice and fairness, and that is the path to security and safety, if you are interested in it. This is what needed to be said. And may peace be upon he who has followed the Guidance."