Statements Regarding Bin Laden
According to Ijaz, the Sudanese government offered the Clinton administration numerous opportunities to arrest bin Laden and those opportunities were met positively by Secretary of State Madeleine Albright but spurned when Susan Rice and counter-terrorism czar Richard Clarke persuaded National Security Advisor Sandy Berger to overrule Albright.
Ijaz’s claims in this regard appeared in numerous Op-Ed pieces including one in the Los Angeles Times and one in the Washington Post co-written with former Ambassador to Sudan Timothy M. Carney .
Similar allegations have been made by Vanity Fair contributing editor David Rose and Richard Miniter, author of Losing bin Laden, in a November 2003 interview with World.
Several sources dispute Ijaz's claim, including the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks on the United States (the 9-11 Commission) which concluded in part “Sudan's minister of defense, Fatih Erwa, has claimed that Sudan offered to hand Bin Laden over to the United States. The Commission has found no credible evidence that this was so. Ambassador Carney had instructions only to push the Sudanese to expel Bin Laden. Ambassador Carney had no legal basis to ask for more from the Sudanese since, at the time, there was no indictment outstanding.”
Read more about this topic: Mansoor Ijaz
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