THE US: US intelligence believes it has identified a key, previously underestimated figure in the September 11th attacks. Kuwaiti-born Khalid Shaikh Mohammed is alleged to have been central to bankrolling and operational planning.
Already on a US wanted list in connection with attempts to bomb US airlines, Mohammed is believed to be in Afghanistan or Pakistan. The US has increased its reward on his head to $25 million, the same as for Osama bin Laden.
On Capitol Hill, members of the Joint Intelligence Committee were being briefed by committee aides on over 200 interviews they have conducted so far into intelligence failures ahead of the attacks.
Aides also interviewed the Minneapolis FBI agent, Ms Colleen Rowley, the author of a letter complaining that her investigations into Zacarias Moussaoui were blocked by Washington headquarters. She will testify publicly to the Senate Judiciary Committee today.
Congressional researchers have also been poring through tens of thousands of pages of evidence and have admitted that there is already more than they expected. The joint committee will start hearing witnesses in private shortly and is not expected to conduct public hearings until June 25th.
And, just hours before the committee met, President Bush, in his most explicit criticism yet of FBI and CIA actions before the attacks, admitted: "I think it's clear that they weren't communicating properly." But he also said there was no evidence the attacks could have been averted if agencies had worked together better.
The role played by Mohammed in the September 11th attacks is understood to have emerged from interrogations of the former al- Qaeda operations chief, Abu Zubaida, whose claims have been supported from other sources.
Muhammed (37), believed to be a relative of Ramzi Ahmed Yousef, now in jail in the US for his involvement in the first World Trade Centre attack in 1993, has already been indicted for his alleged role in a 1995 unsuccessful plot to bomb US aircraft over the Pacific. His alleged role in September 11th makes a direct connection with the first bombing, always suspected but not clearly established.
The Pacific attack was thwarted by arrests in the Philippines. Then Yousef was arrested and deported from Pakistan in 1995 for trial in the US.
US officials believe he is related to Mohammed, who is said to have helped fund his operations, but they do not say how closely.
Mohammed is said to be one of the highest-ranking al-Qaeda leaders still at large, officials said, and continues to plan attacks against US interests. Although born in Kuwait, officials there say he is a Pakistani national. US intelligence sources told the New York Times he ranked in al-Qaeda just under bin Laden and his three top aides - the Palestinian Abu Zubaida; the Egyptian ideologue believed to be the group's number two, Ayman al-Zawahiri; and the organisation's military chief, Mohammed Atef, who died in a US bombing raid on Afghanistan.
