A Summary of Britain’s Case Against Bin Laden, Al Qaeda

The following is a summary of Britain’s detailed evidence connecting Saudi militant Osama bin Laden to the Sept. 11 attacks.

The British government concludes in a 70-point report that only Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda network had “both the motivation and the capability to carry out [the] attacks” of Sept. 11, adding that Britain has further evidence linking Bin Laden to the plot but that it is too sensitive to disclose. The report also warns that Al Qaeda has the will and the resources to carry out further attacks on a similar scale.

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Three of the hijackers in the suicide attacks in New York and near Washington have been “positively identified” as members of Al Qaeda and one of them played a key role in previous assaults on U.S. targets, British Prime Minister Tony Blair told a special session of Parliament on Thursday in London.

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In the run-up to Sept. 11, Bin Laden was mounting a concerted propaganda campaign among Al Qaeda members and like-minded groups justifying attacks on Jewish and American targets and claiming that participants who would die in them were carrying out God’s work.

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Since the hijacked airplane attacks, authorities have learned that Bin Laden had told associates before Sept. 11 that he was preparing a major operation in the United States.

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Detailed planning for the Sept. 11 attacks was carried out by one of Bin Laden’s senior lieutenants. The report does not name this individual.

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In August and early September, close associates of Bin Laden were warned to return to Afghanistan from other parts of the world by Sept. 10.

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Blair gave the lawmakers few details, saying that evidence “of a more direct nature” was withheld to protect intelligence sources.

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The report cautions that the information did not amount to a prosecutable case. But Blair said the evidence was incontrovertible.

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“We have absolutely no doubt that Bin Laden and his network were responsible for the attacks on Sept. 11,” Blair told Parliament, which had been recalled early to hear the evidence.

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Blair said one of the 19 hijackers was involved in the August 1998 bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, which left 224 dead, and the October 2000 bombing of the U.S. destroyer Cole in Yemen in which 17 American sailors died. He did not name the hijacker.

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Blair went on to make the case that Bin Laden and Al Qaeda were able to carry out the attacks on the United States “because of their close alliance with the Taliban regime” in Afghanistan. The Taliban, he said, provided Bin Laden with a safe haven in which to operate and allowed him to establish terrorist training camps.

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He said Bin Laden provided the Taliban with troops, arms and money to fight the country’s main opposition force, the Northern Alliance, and is closely involved in the army’s military training and operations. In return, the Taliban allowed Al Qaeda to operate freely and provide security for ‘the stockpiles of drugs” allegedly trafficked by Al Qaeda.

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As he did earlier this week, Blair made the case that if the Taliban stands between Bin Laden and the U.S.-led effort to capture him, they too must be targeted.

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The document also makes a circumstantial case against Bin Laden, saying that the Sept. 11 attacks bore the trademark of the earlier assaults in East Africa and on the Cole: they were coordinated attacks on the same day, the aim was to maximize American casualties, and no warnings were given.