Al-Qaida planning attack to rival Sept 11 - report

Al-Qaida is planning a mass-casualty attack to rival September 11, but preparations have been disrupted by recent arrests of terror suspects, it was reported today.

Intelligence reports indicate that communications between al-Qaida cells are being restored gradually, officials told the Washington Times.

“The attack will be large-scale” one intelligence official said.

The intelligence reports said any major attack is likely to be preceded by smaller-scale strikes, including assassinations of prominent people in the United States.

Officials did not provide details on the latest threat, which was contained in intelligence reports sent to senior Bush administration officials last week. The warning did not say whether the attacks would be in the United States or abroad.

“We continue to be in a heightened-threat environment,” said an official with access to intelligence reports .

Scores of al-Qaida suspects have been arrested in the past year in more than a dozen countries.

Last week, 28 Pakistanis suspected of being part of an al-Qaida cell were arrested in Naples.

President George Bush said yesterday that the danger from terrorism is growing because terrorists are seeking chemical, biological and nuclear weapons.

“That is a fact,” Mr Bush said. “If their ambitions were ever realised, they would set out to inflict catastrophic harm on the United States, with many times the casualties of September 11.”

Gordon Johndroe, spokesman for the US Homeland Security Department, said a major al-Qaida attack is “something we worry about all the time.”

Al-Qaida, headed by renegade Saudi multi millionaire Osama bin Laden, is also suspected of carrying out the bombing at a Bali nightclub in October that killed nearly 200 people.