Asia-Pacific

Afghan insurgent planned attacks on Britain, US

(Agencies)
Updated: 2007-05-15 13:29

WASHINGTON - Top Taliban commander Mullah Dadullah was training US and British citizens to carry out suicide attacks in their nations before he was killed, according to a video of the insurgent chief aired on US television.

Top Taliban commander Mullah Dadullah was training US and British citizens to carry out suicide attacks in their nations before he was killed, according to a video of the insurgent chief aired on US television. [AFP]

"We are planning to carry out suicide and rocket attacks on those who are committing aggression on

Afghanistan," the bearded fighter said in the subtitled video aired by ABC news on Monday.

"We will be executing attacks in Britain and the US to demonstrate our sincerity and make them understand how hard it is to endure under a foreign occupation," he said.

The attacks would aim "to make their women weep as our women are weeping, to make their elders weep as our elders are weeping and to destroy their cities as they have destroyed our cities."

Both the United States and Britain have troops in Afghanistan after a US-led invasion ousted the fundamentalist Taliban regime in 2001. Multinational

NATO-led forces there are now fighting a fierce Taliban insurgency.

The video was of an interview carried out made some 36 hours before Dadullah's bullet-ridden corpse was recovered from fighting with US, Afghan and NATO forces and displayed on Sunday, the network said.

Linked to the beheading of hostages and training of suicide bombers, Dadullah, aged about 40, was one of the Taliban's top commanders and the most important rebel leader to be killed since the regime was driven from power.

Dressed in a black turban and clothing on the video, he linked his own planned attacks to the Al-Qaeda network, whose leader Osama Bin Laden was driven from Afghanistan by the 2001 invasion.

"We and Al-Qaeda are as one. If we are preparing attacks, then it is likewise the work of Al-Qaeda."