Political India: Engaging America

From The Hindu

The Central Intelligence Agency today announced that it has added radical cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, suspected to be residing in Yemen, to its target list. This makes al-Awlaki only the second U.S. citizen since 2001 whom CIA agents have authorisation to kill or capture.

According to reports the decision to put Awlaki on the “kill list” was taken after U.S. intelligence officials confirmed that he had a key operational role in terrorist attacks.

Reports in January cited U.S. security sources saying that they had “concrete and independent confirmation that al-Awlaki had met with Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian accused in the botched Christmas day terror attack aboard an aircraft; and that al-Awlaki had contact with U.S. Army Major Nidal Hasan, accused of killing 13 people in last November in Fort Hood, Texas.

Sources in the security establishment here said that al-Awlaki has played a key role in the transformation of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), the Yemeni wing of the terrorist network, into the “most active affiliate outside Pakistan and Afghanistan.”

Media reports said Al-Awlaki was known for “delivering fiery sermons at U.S. mosques before moving to Yemen in 2004.” However until his ties to terror suspect Hasan became clear, he was not considered an operational planner.

Al-Awlaki’s addition to the target list came even as Dennis Blair, Director of U.S. National Intelligence said that the government would be willing to “take out” Americans abroad if they present a direct threat to U.S. security: “We take direct action against terrorists in the intelligence community… If… we think that direct action will involve killing an American, we get specific permission to do that,” Mr. Blair said.

Labels: spy agencies, terrorism