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Al-Qaida still a threat, say US officials

(China Daily)
Updated: 2009-09-11 10:21

WASHINGTON: Eight years after the September 11 attacks, a weakened Al-Qaida remains a tenacious enemy, US officials say, but Americans are growing weary of the fight against terror.

The Al-Qaida network is "still very capable" of attacking the United States and "very focused" on its goal, top US military officer Admiral Mike Mullen said last month.

Despite a change of leadership in the White House, the campaign launched by George W. Bush remains a top priority, with his successor Barack Obama vowing to "disrupt, dismantle and defeat Al-Qaida" sheltering in neighboring Pakistan.

The fight against those who staged the attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people in New York and Washington has deprived Osama bin Laden's terror network of a safe haven in Afghanistan, after the US-led invasion toppled the Taliban regime at the end of 2001.

The organization has suffered serious setbacks, with several key figures captured and 11 leaders or associates killed since July 2008, including Abu Khabab al-Masri, chemical arms expert, and Baitullah Mehsud, head of the Pakistan Taliban.

The terror network has not managed an attack in the West since July 2005 and the group's decline has some experts arguing the Qaida threat is starting to recede.

"Twenty-one years since its founding, Al-Qaida is on the defensive, even running out of steam," Jean-Pierre Filiu, professor at the Paris Institute of Political Studies, told AFP.

"It tried to regain the initiative after the US invasion of Iraq but its local branch lost ground... and left in 2006-2007," he said.

US intelligence agencies, however, disagree that Al-Qaida has faded as a threat.

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"Make no mistake about it: they remain a serious threat to the US and our allies," said one US counter-terrorism official, citing the group's ability to recruit terrorists and plan and finance operations. "This is a resilient, determined, and adaptive enemy."

The network has regrouped in Pakistan's tribal areas, where bin Laden and his deputy Ayman Zawahiri have taken refuge, and where it helps direct the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan.

US officials are concerned meanwhile about Al-Qaida's transformation into a network of small terrorist "franchises" spread over Asia, the Middle East and Africa, particularly in unstable countries such as Yemen and Somalia.

Despite US government warnings of the lingering danger posed by Al-Qaida, the public's focus has begun to shift to other concerns amid fatigue with the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that have claimed the lives of more than 5,000 soldiers. Recent polls show public support declining for the Afghan mission.

AFP