GEOSTRATEGY-DIRECT INTELLIGENCE BRIEF
Officials: Bin Laden not running al-Qaida
Zawahiri in charge, Zarqawi emerging as new leader
Posted: May 28, 2004
1:00 a.m. Eastern
Pakistani officials say al-Qaida is becoming more decentralized and its top
leader, Osama bin Laden, may not be running the organization, reports
Geostrategy-Direct, the global intelligence news service.
Instead, there is growing evidence al-Qaida No. 2 leader Ayman al-Zawahiri may
be in charge of the terrorist network.
The officials also said Abu Musab al- Zarqawi, the Jordanian-based al-Qaida
associate, is emerging as a new leader of the group.
Pakistani tribes have begun setting up militias of up to 4,000 fighters who are
being tasked with finding al-Qaida terrorists in Pakistan's remote provinces.
The armed militias, known as "lashkars," are part of a deal between the
regional government and the Islamabad government.
The deal calls for local militias to conduct military operations against
al-Qaida terrorists as long as the Pakistani military stays out of the
operations.
The U.S., Pakistani and Afghan governments are working together to root out
terrorists in the Afghan-Pakistan border region.
As for bin Laden and al-Zawahiri, Pakistani officials believe both could be in
the border region, but there is no hard evidence.
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