| |
The mystery behind the
hoax
By Pepe Escobar
Mohammed
al-Asuquf (or Usuquf) is not a top member of al-Qaeda.
He may not even exist. Intelligence sources in Brussels
guarantee they've never heard of him, or of an
apocalyptic interview he may have granted to Al Jazeera,
allegedly instigated by Osama bin Laden. Some say,
"maybe the spelling is wrong, after all it's an Arabic
name".
In a convoluted telephone conversation,
Al Jazeera's HQ in Qatar confirmed they have never
interviewed or aired an interview with Mohammed
al-Asuquf /Usuquf. So this means this writer and Asia
Times Online were in fact victims of a hoax on November
14. An article was uploaded that day, quoting from an
interview by al-Usuquf, detailing al-Qaeda's alleged
nuclear plans against the US - with the caveat that his
identity could not be established, nor his membership of
al-Qaeda.
A source relayed the interview by
email from Singapore on November 6. This source had
always been reliable - and knew that Asia Times Online
had been tracking al-Qaeda since way before September
11, 2001. The content was chilling, the author was
unknown, the circumstances were somewhat bizarre, but
the source assured there was no good reason to suspect a
hoax.
The information - or disinformation -
surfaced among a stream of red alerts. An al-Qaeda "big
fish" was allegedly in American custody. Osama bin
Laden's latest tape, threatening the US and its allies
in the war against terrorism, had surfaced in Pakistan -
handed over to an Al Jazeera correspondent, Ahmed
Muhaffaq Ziedan. Some intelligence sources are claiming
- with no evidence - that the tape itself was recorded
in a Karachi madrassa and reached Al Jazeera through a
circuituous route via Bangladesh. On the same day the
article was uploaded, the US Federal Bureau of
Investigation issued a "confidential alert" warning of
possible "spectacular" attacks against the US, capable
of causing "massive casualties".
But once the
hoax was established - it is listed here on the website
antivirus.about.com - we put pressure on the Singapore
source to uncover his source. After a while he
was sure it was a "high-ranking member of a foreign
government", who did not want his name to be disclosed,
but then confirmed by email that he too could not
identify who relayed him the information - or
disinformation.
Meanwhile, on November 17, Al
Jazeera released the contents of a six-page text
obtained by its investigative correspondent Yosri Fouda,
in which al-Qaeda reserves itself the right to attack
its aggressors, "to destroy peoples and cities, to
destroy economies and to kill civilians" - the same
message of the fake al-Asuquf/Usuquf interview.
There are no copies of the full text of the
al-Asuquf/Usuquf interview in English on the Internet -
apart from the hoax warning mentioned above. But there
are copies in Portuguese, and they have been circulating
at least since November. 6. We are unaware of copies
circulating in other Western languages.
After
al-Asuquf/Usuquf started talking in cyberspace, we read
the following: "A copy of the interview came to Foz do
Iguazu, and was translated into Portuguese by a
university professor in the city's Arab community. This
is probably the only existing version of this interview
not in Arabic."
Some sources point to Foz do
Iguazu as the key to the riddle. The city is right on
the so-called tri-border region between Brazil,
Argentina and Paraguay. On November 8, CNN heavily
advertised scenic Iguazu Falls - the Brazilian
equivalent of Niagara Falls - as the backdrop for what
it terms a "terrorist paradise" in South America.
CNN claims to have learned from Argentinian
intelligence sources that several Hezbollah operatives,
plus operatives from other groups linked to al-Qaeda,
met recently at the tri-border, in Ciudad del Este
(Paraguay), to plan attacks against US and Israeli
targets.
Argentinian intelligence also recently
met with American intelligence in Washington - and the
main point of discussion was the possibility of a new
terrorist offensive launched from South America.
Ever since September 11, 2001, Washington has
tried very hard to connect the tri-border with the
Lebanese Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad, and also to the
Egyptian Gamaa al-Islamiya - a major al-Qaeda ally. Last
April, the US government officially declared the
tri-border an area of "terrorist activity". The area,
according to Washington, was a "collection center" for
Islamist groups.
But the fact is that the
tri-border is more about the black market, money
laundering and drug trafficking than about terrorism.
The absolute majority of the locals are involved in
legal businesses. There are very lively Taiwanese and
Arab communities. The typical crime is tax evasion.
There is absolutely no evidence of a Hezbollah cell, and
absolutely no evidence of links to al-Qaeda. Locals say
the American accusations have been a tremendous blow to
the formely thriving tourism industry which capitalizes
on the beauty of Iguazu Falls.
Asad Ahmad
Barakat, a Shi'ite Muslim, Lebanese-born Paraguayan
citizen, is going to sue CNN. The network accused him in
its tri-border piece of being involved in the planning
of attacks against the US. Barakat is accused by
Paraguayan justice of criminal association and tax
evasion. He says he is a Hezbollah sympathizer, "like in
Brazil there are millions who sympathize with the
Workers Party, and this is not a crime". He says he has
the support of the Lebanese ambassador in Brazil.
Muhamad Mahmod Ismail, the president of the
association Arab-Brazil, stresses that "the attacks of
the international media against the tri-border are part
of an American policy for the region … Here we have one
of the largest freshwater reservoirs of the Americas,
the huge Itaipu hydroelectric plant, and the third
largest world market [Mercosur]. It's not an accident
that the region has been constantly attacked." No one in
Foz do Iguazu seems to know about an Arab university
professor who translated an al-Qaeda interview.
US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is
currently in Santiago, Chile - not very far from the
tri-border - attending a conference of defense ministers
of the Americas. He said on Monday that the US won't
pressure Latin America for a more active role in the war
against terrorism. Each country, he says, has to decide
how to employ its own methods.
As for the
virtual Mohammed al-Asuquf/Usuquf, the mystery remains.
Who would profit from such a setup? Sources speculate
about two possibilities: Either the hoax was
manufactured as a justification for more intensive
American policing of the strategically crucial
tri-border area; or the hoax was manufactured in the
name of al-Qaeda to reinforce its strategy of instilling
fear.
[Asia Times Online adds: In either
case, we deeply regret being used to propagate someone
else's strategy. There is of course another possibility:
that the entire affair of the hoax interview was aimed
at discrediting Asia Times Online and/or its writer,
Pepe Escobar. We would be a little surprised that we
would be considered important enough for such an
operation, but if this was its aim, it worked. Many
blogs and websites posted the entire text of Escobar's
original article, in blatant violation of our copyright
- and thus our timely retraction of the article, and
explanation on our website, had limited effect in
reducing the damage. Meanwhile, the lesson has been
learned: increased vigilance at this time of rampant
dirty tricks is essential.]
(©2002 Asia Times
Online Co, Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact
content@atimes.com for
information on our sales and syndication
policies.)
|
| |
|
|
 |
|
