Video shows hostage, assassination exercises

Al-Qaida militants practised carrying out a mass assassination of world leaders and an attack on a motorcade, according to a video obtained in Afghanistan and broadcast on Australian television.

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) yesterday aired parts of video tapes recorded at an al-Qaida training camp in Afghanistan that showed what the network said were Arab, Pakistani and African fighters rehearsing hostage-takings and assassinations.

The drills, using live ammunition, appeared to be aimed at potential Western targets, ABC said.

The exercises included detailed plans to attack a motorcade on what appeared to be a road system in Washington DC, in the US and a mass assassination of national leaders at a golf tournament.

In another exercise, those acting as hostages and the attackers practice speaking in English.

ABC said it obtained the six-hour video from Northern Alliance soldiers who found the tapes at a training camp near Kabul, shortly after the Taliban fled the capital.