Political turmoil and a spate of attacks by Taliban are forcing Pakistan President Musharraf to scale back his government's pursuit of al Qaeda, US intelligence officials say.
"Iraq is now a rear-guard action on the part of al Qaeda," General James Conway, the head of the Marine Corps and a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the paper in interview. "They've changed their strategic focus not to Afghanistan but to Pakistan, because Pakistan is the closest place where you have the nexus of terrorism and nuclear weapons."
The two are members of Al Qaeda's sleeper cell and motivate youths of the steel city as well as other parts of Jharkhand to join and expand the organisation, he said.
Afghanistan and Pakistan remains a number-one area as the launch point for strategic attacks from Al Qaeda terror network, a top Pentagon official said on Wednesday.
The United States must henceforth adopt policies that treat Al Qaeda and the Taliban as a hostile state, says scholar Harold Gould.
United States President Barack Obama on Wednesday said America had "turned the tide of war" in Afghanistan in the last three years, asserting that his goal to defeat the Al Qaeda and deny it a chance to rebuild was now "within reach".
Afghanistan is "heading towards civil war" and terror group Al Qaeda "will probably come back" as the security situation in the region continues to deteriorate, UK Defence Secretary Ben Wallace said on Friday.
A madrassa teacher from Bengaluru has been arrested by Delhi Police for suspected links with Al Qaeda, making it the fourth arrest in its ongoing operation against the terror outfit.
Osama bin Laden, towards the last phase of his life, had considered changing the name of Al Qaeda because of the bad image it developed over the years and with Muslims losing faith in the outfit, a top United States official has said.
"We never rule out any options, including striking actionable targets," the White House Press Secretary Tony Snow said.
After the United States intercepted Al Qaeda's most serious threat in recent years to target its embassies, country's Special Forces have been put on high alert to hit potential targets of the outfit in the Middle East, a media report has said.
The forensic examination of the disc, being done by a special team of experts from central security agencies, found nearly 17,000 files stored in it and this included a movie prepared by al Qaeda to brainwash recruits for global terrorism.
Al Qaeda not only looks upon India as a close associate of the US similar to the UK, but also as providing favourable conditions for its overseas operations directed against US nationals and interests in Indian territory.
He also ruled out Al Qaeda's relations with militant groups operating in Jammu and Kashmir.
What Richard Holbrooke is going to deal with in Pakistan is far beyond the realms of cognitive processes. There is nothing like this in the Balkans where he impressed with his forceful diplomatic skills. The Khyber is a mysterious place that breeds poltergeist stories. Yazid's reappearance testifies to the region's strange powers.
Long before Osama bin Laden was killed, Al Qaeda had adapted itself to survive and operate without him, says Amir Mir
A top Al-Qaeda operative deliberately planted information linking the terrorist outfit with Iraq to encourage the US invasion of the country, a spy who infiltrated the outfit has claimed.
Another attack on America is only "inevitable", Vice Admiral (retd) John Scott Redd, the head of the National Counter Terrorism Center, told the Newsweek magazine.
According to media reports, Al Qaeda warned in a video that Indo-US diplomatic missions were the terror network's legitimate targets.
In another significant blow to Al Qaeda's top leadership, a senior United States official said on Thursday that the terrorist outfit's chief of operations in Pakistan Abu Hafs al-Shahri has been killed in the country's northwest tribal region.
The documents seized from Osama bin Laden's compound in Pakistan's Abbottabad city in the May 2 raid confirm that the then al Qaeda chief was obsessive about documenting everything, and that the terrorist organisation functioned like a multinational corporate company.
Al Qaeda's second-in-command Atiyah Abd al-Rahman has been killed in a United States drone attack in the mountains of Pakistan's Waziristan area, American officials have said, further damaging the terror group that appears weakened since the death of Osama bin Laden in May.
Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Tayiba is acting in a more Al Qaeda-like manner after being 'infected' by the ideas of Osama bin Laden's terror network and poses the highest risk to the United States, according to a top American counter-terrorism expert.
The security alert was issued on Wednesday after the Director of Trichy Airport in Tamil Nadu received an anonymous letter warning of an attack by al-Qaeda at airports or on aircraft in South India.
These questions will need careful examination before one can come to a definitive conclusion on the implications of this message. But so many unanswered questions should not make us underestimate the importance of strengthened security in response to it.
Over two months after the killing of its leader Osama bin Laden, United States' counter-terrorism officials believe that terror outfit Al Qaeda is on the brink of collapse. "US counter-terrorism officials are increasingly convinced that the killing of Osama bin Laden and the toll of seven years of CIA drone strikes have pushed Al-Qaeda to the brink of collapse," The Washington Post reported.
'Accept Islam along with your disciples or face death,' the Al Qaeda letter, which orginated from Uttarakhand, reportedly said.
A number of prominent ideologues linked to jihadist outfits in the Middle East took to social media to cheer the prospect of a Trump presidency, The Washington Post reported.
United States President Barack Obama on Wednesday said that the US has succeeded in its mission in Afghanistan by "severely" crippling the Al Qaeda there and vowed to keep pressure on the terror group until that network is entirely defeated.
'If there is a military standoff eyeball to eyeball on the western border, the Chinese could create problems by making movements in the north, in our northeast, which could involve us tying down some forces there so that could stretch our military actions.'
Al Qaeda on Friday confirmed the death of its chief Osama bin Laden, five days after the dreaded terrorist was killed by American commandos in Pakistan's Abbottabad town, warning that his blood would not be "wasted" and attacks against the US and it allies would continue.
Yasin was also responsible for the 2009 attack on a bus carrying the Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore.
"I think the most significant thing in the recent situation is the threat has moved into Pakistan proper to threaten the very existence of the (state). Pakistan has now recognised that this is an existential threat to their very survival," director of US national intelligence Admiral Michael McConnell said.
The United States has issued a global travel alert and ordered its embassies throughout the Muslim world to close down temporarily, amid fears of an Al Qaeda terror strike, particularly in the Middle East and North Africa.
The letter was received two days ago and warns of bombs in trains.
"Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula is an extension of Al Qaeda core coming out of Pakistan. And, in my view, it is one of the most lethal and one of the most concerning of it," John Brennan, assistant to the US President for Counterterrorism and Homeland Security, told media persons at a White House briefing.
In the wake of the announcement that the United States has killed Osama nin Laden, Indian intelligence agencies fear that the number of Al Qaeda-led terrorist attacks, especially on the US, will increase.
Buoyed by a ceasefire deal negotiated by Pakistan in 2007, the Al Qaeda has rebuilt some of its pre-September 11 capabilities, leading to major spike in attacks within the country and neighbouring Afghanistan, the United States State Department's latest annual terrorism report says. The ceasefire negotiated by Pakistan in 2007 gave Al Qaeda leaders "greater mobility and ability to conduct training and operational planning, particularly those targeting Western Europe," it said
Al Qaeda is trying to topple the government in nuclear powered Pakistan, the US warned on Sunday. Vice President Joe Biden said the Obama administration is trying "to make sure that terrorists do not in fact, bring down the Pakistani government, which is a nuclear power."
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