Al-Qaeda threatens US

2005-08-04 15:24

Cairo - Al-Qaeda deputy leader Ayman al-Zawahri threatened more destruction in London, and warned that the United States would suffer tens of thousands of military dead if it did not withdraw its troops from Iraq immediately.

"Blair has brought to you destruction in central London, and he will bring more of that, God willing," al-Zawahri said in the tape, which was broadcast on the pan-Arab satellite channel Al-Jazeera. He was blaming Blair for the bombings on three London subway trains and a bus on July 7 that killed 56 people.

In London, Blair's Downing Street office declined to comment on the broadcast.

Wagging his finger at the audience, al-Zawahri spoke with a Kalashnikov rifle propped up against a plain background. He wore a white robe with a black turban.

Al-Zawahri is an Egyptian doctor and Islamic militant who merged his faction with that of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan in the late 1990s.

Turning to the United States, he warned that it could expect vastly greater casualties from its military campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"As for you, the Americans, what you have seen in New York and Washington, what losses that you see in Afghanistan and Iraq, despite the media blackout, is merely the losses of the initial clashes," he said.

"If you go on with the same policy of aggression against Muslims, you will see, with God's will, what will make you forget the horrible things in Vietnam and Afghanistan."

Referring to US President George W Bush, secretary of state Condoleezza Rice and defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld, al-Zawahri told Americans: "The truth that has been kept from you by Bush, Rice and Rumsfeld is that there is no way out of Iraq without immediate withdrawal, and any delay on this means only more dead, more losses. If you don't leave today, certainly you will leave tomorrow, and after tens of thousands of dead, and double that figure in disabled and wounded."

Referring to the Western nations who have contributed troops to the US-led multinational force in Iraq, al-Zawahri said: "As to the nations of the crusader alliance, we have offered you a truce if you leave the land of Islam.

"Hasn't Sheik Osama bin Laden told you that you will not dream of security before there is security in Palestine and before all the infidel armies withdraw from the land of Muhammed," al-Zawahri, added referring to the leader of the al-Qaeda network, bin Laden.

"Our message is clear: you will not be safe until you withdraw from our land, stop stealing our oil and wealth and stop supporting the corrupt rulers," al-Zawahri said.

- AP