U.S. Details Threats Linked to Clinton Trip

Several terrorist groups have directed threats at President Clinton in connection with his weeklong visit to South Asia, including an assassination plot directly linked to accused terrorist leader Osama bin Laden, officials here said Wednesday.

On Monday, the Secret Service abruptly canceled Clinton’s scheduled trip to Joypura, a village in rural Bangladesh, after intelligence indicated that Islamic zealots were planning to fire a shoulder-launched missile at the president’s helicopter, officials said. Several hundred villagers instead were bused to the U.S. Embassy in Dhaka, the capital, to meet with Clinton.

“We were watching this for several weeks,” said a senior Clinton administration official who declined to be named. “Then we picked up something specific last weekend, and the Secret Service said, ‘That’s it.’ They were already sweating.”

The Joypura threat highlights the potential danger Clinton faces as he travels this week in a region that is home to some of the world’s most active and dangerous terrorist groups. Several harbor distinct grudges against the president, according to U.S. officials, and one threatening e-mail recently urged: “Send Clinton Back in a Coffin.”

“Clearly there are higher security concerns on this trip,” the administration official acknowledged. “No question about it.”

The Bangladesh episode also marks another worrisome round in Washington’s cat-and-mouse game with Bin Laden, the exiled Saudi fugitive who faces U.S. charges for allegedly masterminding the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania that killed 224 people. It was at least the second plot by Bin Laden to assassinate Clinton, U.S. officials allege.

It was not immediately clear if the plot in Bangladesh was hatched by Harkat Jihad, an extremist group financed by Bin Laden. The group first drew attention in January, when three members allegedly tried to kill a leading Bangladeshi poet because of his liberal beliefs. At least 18 Harkat members were arrested or detained in the attack.

U.S. officials say Bin Laden supports other groups in Bangladesh. They trace the connection to the 1980s, when many Bangladeshis joined him in the struggle to oust the Soviets from Afghanistan.

White House aides declined to discuss security practices as Clinton traveled Wednesday from India’s capital, New Delhi, to Agra, where he toured the Taj Mahal.

Although evidence of assassination plots has been strongest in Bangladesh, the senior official said, broad threats have also been traced to groups in India and Pakistan.

In January, New Delhi police announced that they had arrested Sayed abu Nasir, a Bangladeshi allegedly linked to Bin Laden. Indian authorities said Nasir headed a terrorist ring that planned to bomb the U.S. Embassy in New Delhi as well as U.S. consulates in Calcutta and Madras.

Clinton’s aides say security for the president will be at its highest level during his brief visit to Pakistan on Saturday.

One reason is the Harkat Moujahedeen, a radical Islamic group based in Pakistan. The group, which is closely linked to Bin Laden, is battling to overthrow Indian control in the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir. U.S. officials have blamed the group for the Christmas Eve hijacking of an Indian Airlines jet in which one passenger was killed.

More to the point, U.S. intelligence officials say, the Harkat Moujahedeen suffered numerous casualties when Clinton ordered cruise missile strikes in August 1998 against remote camps in eastern Afghanistan linked to Bin Laden in retaliation for the embassy bombings in East Africa. As a result, the group has vowed to seek revenge against Clinton.

“They were hard hit in the cruise missile attacks,” a U.S. intelligence official said. “They haven’t forgotten that.”

A blunt, if unspecific, threat came in an e-mail that the London-based International Islamic Front for Jihad Against Jews and Crusaders sent to its followers.

“Send Clinton Back in a Coffin. One Clinton, One Bullet, One Coffin,” the e-mail threatens, according to an official who has seen it. The three-page missive mostly recounts what it alleges are Clinton’s transgressions against Islam.

U.S. security officials have also voiced concern about the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, the fierce guerrilla army that has fought since 1983 to create an independent Tamil state in Sri Lanka.

The Tamil Tigers, as they are known, have never targeted U.S. officials or property, partly because they raise funds overseas. But the group has repeatedly used assassination and other terrorist tactics at home. Suicide bombers from the group killed Sri Lankan President Ranasinghe Premadasa in 1993 and former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1991.

Bin Laden operatives have tried to assassinate Clinton at least once before, according to U.S. officials and State Department reports.

The FBI investigation of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing in New York produced evidence that Bin Laden had ordered a team of would-be assassins to use shoulder-fired missiles or explosives against Clinton’s motorcade in Manila during his visit to the Philippines in November 1994. Heavy security prevented the attack, officials say.

U.S. officials insist that the hunt for Bin Laden is paying off, even if he remains at large in Afghanistan. With recent arrests in the United States, Jordan, France and elsewhere, authorities insist that they have shattered several Bin Laden cells and networks, repeatedly thwarted his plans and, in some cases, prevented attacks.

“We’ve been doing a lot better than many people think,” said Bruce Hoffman, a terrorism expert at the Rand Corp., an independent think tank based in Santa Monica. “But we have to be lucky all the time. He only has to be lucky once.”

Moreover, Hoffman says, Bin Laden’s stature continues to grow. “He issues a threat, and we react,” he said. “He makes the U.S. jump. People respect that. He’s a sole individual confronting a superpower. He’s a real P.T. Barnum.”

Kenneth Katzman, senior Mideast expert at the Congressional Research Service, says he fears that Bin Laden is stronger than U.S. officials admit. “When I hear that he’s under wraps and we’ve got him cornered, I don’t buy it,” he said. “Sooner or later, one of his plots will succeed.”

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Times staff writer Edwin Chen in Jaipur, India, contributed to this report.

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INDIAN NUCLEAR RISKS

Nuclear weapons do not guarantee national security, President Clinton tells India. A13