WASHINGTON: In the three months since President Bush insisted that countries around the globe choose sides in the war on terrorism, several nations closely connected with terrorist violence have taken tentative steps toward cooperation.
Sudan shared intelligence and began restricting the financing of terror networks. Yemen stepped up its cooperation in the investigation of the USS Cole bombing and sent security forces in search of Al Qaeda members. Even Syria, a haven for several “terrorist” groups, has done “some helpful things,” a senior Bush aide said.
Administration officials remain cautious, acknowledging that the commitment behind these contributions to the anti-terrorist cause is untested. Secretary of State Colin L. Powell spoke earlier this month in terms of “opportunities,” while another top foreign policy official said a better measure will come when the countries are asked to do more.
“In some cases, we’ve gotten doors wide open, like Pakistan. In other places, the door seems to be more open, as in Yemen. In other places, there are cracks in the door, and now we’ll see whether we can exploit that further,” the official reported. ”We’re still not at the point of asking people to do very difficult things.”
The attacks on Sept 11 accelerated a trend under way in several countries that were tired of chilly relations with the West and eager to be removed from the State Department’s list of state sponsors of terrorism. Notably, Sudan and Libya offered valuable intelligence about Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden’s operations, according to US officials.
Sudan, which had harboured Osama until 1996, began discussing counterterrorism with the United States in mid-2000. The government in Khartoum has arrested suspected militants and begun moving against extremist organizations based in Sudan, although Hezbollah and the Egyptian Islamic Jihad continue to have “a small presence” there, a US counterterrorism official said.
“The cooperation level is serious,” said a high-ranking US official, who reported that information-sharing by African intelligence services has never been so extensive. Since Sept 11, Sudan has offered hundreds of intelligence files, as well as reports on flows of money and people.
Similarly hopeful of improved relations, Libyan leader Moammar Qadhafi condemned the attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade Center as “horrific” and endorsed US retaliation a notable development by a onetime anti-American leader targeted in 1986 by US bombs.
Yemen, which had been cited as a country with a poor record on terrorism, took significant steps after Sept 11. Just last week, government forces launched attacks on the country’s central Marib region in search of suspected Al Qaeda fighters. An administration official called the assault a “good-faith effort” while saying that it remains unclear whether the government can wage a successful offensive.
The administration’s success in routing the Taliban in Afghanistan and the open talk of future targets Defence Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld this month mentioned targets in Yemen and Somalia as possibilities might be a motivating factor for foreign leaders.
“Deterrence may not work against individuals and shadowy non-state actors, but what happened to the Taliban can’t help but put the fear of God into a number of other terrorist-supporting states,” said Gideon Rose, managing editor of Foreign Affairs. ”People will see the US was hit, and it hit back very hard and very severely and very effectively.”
Future phases of the anti-terrorism struggle are likely to become more complicated, particularly when the targets include organizations sustained, harboured or tolerated by foreign governments inside their borders. Last week, for example, Powell pressed President Pervez Musharraf, to crack down on Lashkar-i-Taiba and Jaish-i-Mohammad, two Pakistan-based organizations suspected of staging the recent attack on the Indian Parliament.
“We have been urging action against these groups for some time,” said a US official familiar with the situation, who noted that Lashkar-i-Tayyaba, in particular, has deep roots in Pakistan, making the organization a difficult target. The country’s political divisions and the fissures within its powerful Inter-Services Intelligence Agency hinder the chances for a wholesale shift in policy, analysts contend.
Iraq and North Korea, on the other hand, have done nothing to win points since Sept 11, Powell said, while Iran and Syria have moved only slightly. He said the latter two countries have ”shown some openness to dialogue and some openness to cooperation that may present opportunities that we are trying to explore carefully.” Most notably, Iran allowed the United States to unload as much as 165,000 tons of US wheat at Iranian ports and offered to conduct search-and-rescue missions for downed American pilots during the war in Afghanistan.
The US official familiar with the situation said Syria ”might be willing to take some limited steps,” which the official would not detail, describing them as “not earth-shattering.” Another senior Bush staffer noted that the Damascus government’s support for terrorist organizations has not stopped. —Dawn/LAT-WP News Service (c) The Washington Post.