Terror tape lists Canada as target
Tape attributed to bin Laden signals entry into terrorist 'frame of consciousness'
Stewart Bell
National Post
An audiotaped statement said to have been recorded by Osama bin Laden and aired yesterday on the Arabic-language channel Al-Jazeera explicitly threatens Canada for the first time over its role in the U.S.-led war on terrorism.
In a rambling speech that praised recent terrorist attacks in Bali, Yemen and Moscow, the speaker admonishes six Western countries including Canada for joining the international campaign to dismantle bin Laden's al-Qaeda network.
"Why did your governments ally themselves with America to attack us in Afghanistan, and I cite in particular Great Britain, France, Italy, Canada, Germany and Australia?
"As you kill, you will be killed," threatens the statement attributed to the Saudi terror mastermind, who may or may not still be alive. "Do your governments not know that the White House gang are the biggest butchers of the era?"
It continues: "If you don't like looking at your dead ... so remember our dead, including the children in Iraq."
Experts said the voice sounds like that of bin Laden, but intelligence officials in Washington had not yet verified the tape's authenticity. The reference to the Bali bombing -- in which two Canadians were killed -- and the Moscow hostage-taking means it was recorded in the past few weeks.
But even if it is not bin Laden, the tape demonstrates that Canada is now in the sights of Islamic extremists. The mere denunciation of Canada on Al-Jazeera, which is watched by millions in the Muslim world, will be enough to convince some radicals that Canadians are acceptable targets, a former intelligence agent said.
"We have entered their frame of consciousness and therefore will become more and more suitable targets," said Michel Juneau-Katsuya, a former Canadian Security Intelligence Service officer. "We have become proper targets."
There has been an ongoing debate in Ottawa about whether Canada could be targeted for attacks by Islamic extremist groups such as al-Qaeda. When bin Laden declared a Muslim holy war in 1998, he called for attacks against Americans, Jews and their allies.
Some have argued that Canada is at risk by virtue of being an ally of both the United States and Israel. The government, however, has promoted the notion that Canadians are not targets and are in danger only if they find themselves at the wrong place at the wrong time.
But last week, Ward Elcock, the CSIS director, warned in a speech in Vancouver that "our close friendship and support of the United States, including out participation in Afghanistan, could see Canada or Canadians targeted for attack."
Canadians are not "insulated from terrorism" and must remain vigilant, Mr. Elcock said. He also warned that al-Qaeda has not been destroyed by the war on terrorism and remains a dangerous international force that is "willing and able to strike."
In Ottawa, a Foreign Affairs spokesman said the taped message does not change anything.
"From the beginning -- from Sept. 11, 2001, and even before that -- it's been seen as a global threat and only a global response can deal with it," Rodney Moore said. "No country has felt isolated from this."
Canada has not previously been singled out in any of the numerous statements, audiotapes or videos purported to have been made by bin Laden and his band of al-Qaeda leaders.
The country's inclusion in the latest threat suggests Islamic militants have woken up to Canada's role in the military campaign in Afghanistan and the ongoing Canadian police and intelligence investigations aimed at disrupting al-Qaeda and rooting out its cells in the West.
"I'm not surprised," Mr. Juneau-Katsuya, now a private-sector security consultant at the Northgate Group, said of the broadcast.
The recent wave of terrorist attacks, including the Oct. 6 bombing of a French tanker in Yemen, the shooting of U.S. troops in Kuwait and the Oct. 12 bombing of an Indonesian nightclub crowded with foreign tourists, shows that all Westerners are now targets, he said.
"That is, in my point of view, evidence of a new chapter in this fight against terrorism that we have embarked on, which is that basically it's literally globalized itself because the targets are not just Americans or allies like Israel, but Canada can be one of them."
On the tape played on Al-Jazeera, the speaker identified as bin Laden called the recent terror attacks "only a reaction in response to what [President George W.] Bush, the pharaoh of the age, is doing by killing our sons in Iraq and what America's ally Israel is doing, bombarding houses with women and old people and children inside with American planes."
The White House said the CIA was analyzing the tape. "We've seen the reports, we're looking into it, but at this point we're not making any judgments as to whose voice is on the tape," said Sean McCormack, the White House national security spokesman.
One U.S. official said it sounds like bin Laden's voice, but "something of this import, we want to be as sure as we can be."
Bin Laden has not been since since last year and intelligence officials are not certain whether he is dead or alive. If he is alive, he is thought to be hiding in Afghanistan or the lawless tribal areas of Pakistan.
Al-Jazeera, a satellite channel based in Qatar, did not say how it obtained the tape.
In September, Al-Jazeera aired voice recordings of bin Laden and top al-Qaeda operatives. The CIA authenticated bin Laden's voice then, but officials said the recordings probably weren't made recently.
Those statements came out around the anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and the start of the war in Afghanistan.
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