U.S., “Bin Laden Audiotape”

As the audiotape containing the voice of Osama Bin Laden has been confirmed to be genuine by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, which was aired by Arabic-language television Al-Jazeera on January 4, the fear of a terrorism act surpassing the 9/11 tragedy is spreading throughout the country.

The U.S. administration and CIA regard the voice of Bin Laden as a signal for a new attack aiming at the United States. This is because most of the large scale terror attacks from Al Qaeda have been carried out just after an audiotape broadcast of a terror warning by Bin Laden’s side.

On the tape aired by Al-Jazeera on January 4, a certain person who asserted himself as Bin Laden appears to urge people to immediately lead a Jihad, a sacred war, against the U.S. and not to cooperate with the U.S.’ effort to occupy Iraq and establish peace in the Middle East.

On the other hand, a certain high-level U.S. official revealed on January 5 that they have tracked down evidence that the suspects of successive bombing terror events in November 2003 in Turkey had met with Bin Laden before the 9/11 tragedy.

“It seems that the suspects of the Istanbul terror act have gone through terrorist discipline at the camps in Pakistan and Afghanistan. They may have met with Bin Laden individually before 9/11 terror attack,” this official, under conditions of anonymity, remarked.

This information shows that Bin Laden has planned the terror against Turkey for a long time, which is a member country of the U.S. led-NATO despite it being an Islamic country, he added.

Jung-Ahn Kim credo@donga.com