US 'knew about 9/11'

US OFFICIALS knew months before September 11, 2001, that Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network was planning to use aircraft to carry out a terrorist attack, a former FBI translator has alleged.

Sibel Edmonds told The Independent newspaper, in an interview published yesterday, that a claim by US President George W Bush's national security adviser Condoleezza Rice that there had been no such warnings was "an outrageous lie".

The former translator with the US Federal Bureau of Investigation said she had discussed her claims during a three-hour closed-door session with a US commission looking into the September 11 attacks.