Al Qaeda videos recovered from LeT operative's house in US

By Arun Kumar, Washington, Nov 7: A Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) plot to launch new terror attacks in India with the help of two Pakistan-born Chicago men has taken a new turn with FBI agents recovering two inflammatory Al Qaeda videos from the house of one of them.

The videos recovered from the house of Pakistan-born Canadian Tahawwur Hussain Rana, who was arrested last month along with the other accused David Coleman Headley, a Pakistan-born American national, contain speeches by Osama bin Laden and other terrorist leaders.

According to prosecutors, the two were planning attacks on National Defence College in Delhi, Doon School in Dehradun and Woodstock in Mussourie, besides some other facilities at LeT's behest.

Investigators from two Indian intelligence agencies, the Intelligence Bureau (IB) and the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) are in the US to assist the FBI. They want to particularly question Headley, who had made several trips to Pakistan and was in constant touch with LeT leaders.

Federal prosecutors in a supporting affidavit submitted to a Chicago court Friday informed judge Nan R. Nolan about the new videos recovered from the living room of 48-year-old Rana, who has been living in Chicago for nearly a decade.

Produced by As Sahab Media, commonly acknowledged to be the media wing of Al Qaeda, one of the videos is titled "Bombing of Denmark Embassy".

The 54-minute video on Denmark "was contained on a DVD recovered from the living room of defendant Rana's home on October 18, 2009", federal prosecutors said.

Narrated by Abu Yahya al-Libi, an Al Qaeda spokesman who reportedly escaped from American custody in Afghanistan, it explicitly calls for violent action to retaliate against Denmark for the publication of cartoons of Prophet Mohammad by Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten.

According to the FBI affidavit, the DVD also prominently features the video of the man who carried out a suicide car bombing of the Danish embassy in Islamabad June 2, 2008.

The second "video begins with a speech by Osama bin Laden, and profiles the lives and deaths of four men who were described as having died in the fight on behalf of Islam. The video also included remarks by Mustafa Abu al-Yazid, who appeared on the Denmark video," the affidavit said.

Rana, who is charged with supporting a conspiracy that began in Pakistan in late 2008, has admitted that he and Headley were upset about the cartoons in the Danish newspaper.

Rana Friday submitted a fresh bail application before the court in which he argued that an attack on a newspaper would not qualify as involving or promoting a crime of terrorism.

Federal prosecutors argued that by definition alone Rana's acts meet the criteria of terrorism.

--IANS