April 18 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. should
intensify its hunt for Osama bin Laden because the al-Qaeda leader is
inspiring and directing terrorist attacks more than four years after Sept.
11, according to Saudi Arabia's new ambassador to the U.S.
Prince Turki al-Faisal, who met with bin
Laden years ago as Saudi intelligence chief, criticized the ``lack of
resources'' devoted to finding bin Laden. ``He should be a primary target
for the United States and the world community,'' Turki said yesterday in
an interview in Washington.
The envoy said the U.S. should be adding
rather than withdrawing forces in Afghanistan and ought to enlist other
countries in the pursuit of bin Laden. Saudi Arabia may be willing to
contribute troops to such an effort, he said.
Saudi Arabia, the world's biggest oil
exporter, is under threat from al-Qaeda, and Turki said the ``cult'' has
grown into a global franchise. The biggest blow to the terrorist
organization would be the capture of bin Laden, he said.
The U.S. plans to reduce its 23,000
troops in Afghanistan by roughly 6,500 by the end of the summer in the
Central Asian nation as North Atlantic Treaty Organization and Afghan
security forces take on more responsibility, said Air Force Major Todd
Vician, a Pentagon spokesman. There are about 5,000 soldiers from other
nations in the U.S.-led force.
Islamic Court
If captured, bin Laden should be handed
over to Saudi Arabia and tried in an Islamic court because ``he's broken
every law in the Islamic sharia'' or religious law, Turki said.
Turki's comments reflected a Saudi
frustration with U.S. Middle East policy. The envoy noted that Iraq hadn't
turned out as policy makers had envisioned, and suggested that the war
there has been a distraction from the goal of getting bin Laden.
The Iraq invasion has been a ``boon, if
you like, for al- Qaeda and not just in Iraq, I think in other places as
well,'' Turki said. He was also wary about the possibility of a U.S.
military strike to destroy Iran's suspected nuclear arms program, which
would invite retaliation against U.S. interests.
Turki said Saudi Arabia is producing all
the oil it can and would rely on cooperation with other countries to
respond to any supply disruption from Iran. He said Saudi Arabia opposes a
U.S. military strike on Iran to rid it of its nuclear program since ``the
consequences of military action'' there ``would be as unhealthy as it has
been in Iraq, if not more so.''
Succeeding Bandar
The 61-year-old Turki, educated in the
U.S., took over as the ambassador last year, succeeding Prince Bandar bin
Sultan, who served during four U.S. presidential administrations starting
in 1983.
Turki hasn't been in Washington long
enough to cultivate the social ties that Prince Bandar did with the Bush
family. Unlike the gregarious Bandar, a former military pilot and dean of
the diplomatic corps, the soft-spoken Turki has a long history of working
with the U.S. intelligence community and has begun to reach out to
Congress and the media.
As the intelligence chief, he met with
the Saudi-born bin Laden in the context of Saudi support for Muslim
fighters in Afghanistan in the 1980s, and mediated between the ousted
Taliban regime and the Saudi government.
Turki said he believes bin Laden ``is
alive and well and living and traveling between Afghanistan and
Pakistan.'' While al-Qaeda has been ``hit hard,'' its fugitive leader
remains a potent symbol, he said.
Credibility and Stature
Bin Laden's periodic speeches give ``him
a credibility and the stature that can only remind me of someone like
Robin Hood or Ali Baba and the 40 thieves -- someone who is indomitable,
invincible, uncapturable, able to thumb his nose at the world community.''
Turki said after an initial
unwillingness to accept mistakes had been made in the Iraq invasion, Bush
administration officials are now admitting that ``the situation is not as
good as they would like it to be.''
He praised, in particular, Secretary of
State Condoleezza Rice, who he said has a ``very open view of how we can
work together in trying to improve the situation in Iraq.''
Saudi Arabia seeks better cooperation
with the U.S. on thwarting Saudis fighting in Iraq. U.S. forces should
allow Saudi interrogators to participate in the questioning of captured
Saudis, he said.
U.S. officials say Saudi Arabia could do
more to crack down on money going to terrorists in Iraq and elsewhere. In
testimony before the Senate Banking Committee on April 4, the
undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence at the Treasury
Department, Stuart Levey, said the U.S. remains concerned that Saudi money
is funding terrorism abroad.
`Central Front'
While Saudi Arabia wants more action to
find bin Laden in the mountains along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border,
President George W. Bush earlier this month reiterated his view that Iraq
is the ``central front'' in the war on terrorism.
Ayman al-Zawahiri, bin Laden's deputy,
has appeared in two videos this year, calling on Bush to admit defeat in
Iraq and Afghanistan, and mocking U.S. forces for failing to kill him in
an air strike in Pakistan.
Al-Qaeda's Saudi roots have fed negative
views of the kingdom that Turki said he is trying to overcome in visits to
U.S. cities. The U.S.-Saudi relationship suffered after it was revealed
that 15 of the 19 hijackers on Sept. 11 were Saudi.
Turki also has sought to broaden Saudi
contacts beyond the executive branch in Washington, where his predecessor
Bandar focused his energy. In the months before he departed Washington,
Bandar spent more time outside the capital than in the city, sometimes
vacationing at his house in Aspen, Colorado.
The kingdom began to send foreign policy
adviser Adel al- Jubeir before the cameras in Washington to explain his
country's policies, especially in counter-terrorism efforts.
Cultivating Lawmakers
Educated at Georgetown University in
Washington, Turki presented his credentials to Bush in December. He is
placing a renewed Saudi emphasis on cultivating U.S. lawmakers.
``Over the years, I think we've always
been remiss in not expanding that contact with other areas of authority,
particularly the Congress,'' Turki said.
He says he is also trying to strengthen
ties to the media, which has ``been consistently and I think unfairly
critical of the kingdom,'' he said.
While Bandar was known as an avid Dallas
Cowboys football fan, Turki said he isn't certain he will follow in his
footsteps.
When Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones
asked Turki if he too would back the Cowboys, ``I said, `I'm too new here
to have any specific team,''' Turki said. ``But if I do support someone,''
he added, ``I was not going to tell Mr. Jones who it is.''
