World ‘woefully unprepared’ for al-Qaida bioterror attack

A BIOTERRORIST attack is not a case of “if” but “when”, the international police organisation Interpol warned today, citing threats by the al-Qaida terror network to use biological weapons.

Interpol Secretary General Ronald Noble said the world was woefully unprepared to cope with such an attack and said there was too little co-operation between law enforcement and public health authorities on the issue.

“In my view, al-Qaida’s global network, its proven capabilities, its deadly history, its desire to do the unthinkable and the evidence collected about its bioterrorist ambitions ominously portend a clear and present danger of the highest order that al-Qaida will perpetrate a biological terrorist attack,” he said at the opening session of a three-day workshop to train African police agencies on how to reduce the risk of bioterrorism.