The interrogations of Khan and Aruchi then led officials to Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani, who was captured on July 25. Ghailani is a Tanzanian wanted by the United States in connection with the 1998 bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. A laptop computer seized with him contained maps and messages, apparently from scouts who had entered some of the targeted locations in the United States.
These documents were produced before the Sept. 11 attacks. U.S. officials have said they included updated information on one building as late as January 2004, but the officials were not certain whether it amounted to new surveillance or whether it was information publicly available.
A Pakistani paramilitary soldier takes position in a bunker in the volatile Waziristan tribal region, near the Afghan border.
(Hafiz Wazir -- Reuters)
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In most cases, Pakistani officials said, once suspects have been captured, the CIA has taken control of the interrogations and custody of the computer files and other documents.
The intensity of the recent fighting in Waziristan, a northwestern tribal region bordering Afghanistan, has surprised Pakistani officials. Thousands of troops have been fighting in Waziristan for two months, when the military launched an offensive against the suspected hideout of Osama bin Laden's deputy, Ayman Zawahiri. Although Zawahiri has not been located, the fierceness of the resistance indicated to Pakistan troops that they were likely attacking an area populated by major al Qaeda suspects.
"We had fairly solid intelligence that at least Ayman al Zawahiri was roaming in this region," said a senior Pakistani intelligence official. "Once we penetrated the area, we didn't find Zawahiri, but we definitely confronted and killed many future Zawahiris in this area."
"The Pakistanis are pounding away at Waziristan," one senior U.S. national security official said.
Thirteen Pakistani troops, including three officers, were killed Thursday when a military helicopter crashed in Waziristan, near the garrison town of Kohat. A suicide bomber attacked the house of a senior military commander in the town last month, killing two senior intelligence officials. At least 100 Pakistani troops and 200 people, including local tribesmen, non-Pakistani Arabs and other foreigners, have been killed in the region. Authorities said hundreds of people have fled their homes.
After a fierce rocket attack Wednesday night on military checkpoints in the tribal town of Shikai, authorities imposed economic punishment on the community, restricting the flow of local produce -- apricots, plums and dry fruit -- into local markets.
"The situation is still explosive because al Qaeda elements and their local supporters are running hit-and-run operations in a different terrain," said a Pakistani intelligence officer based in Peshawar.
Priest reported from Washington. Correspondent Glenn Frankel in London contributed to this report.
