Reply #243: Saddam, Osama and me (Prince Turki al-Faisal)

[shraby]

(Filed: 03/08/2003) an interview

One of the main reasons, of course, that Saudi Arabia's conduct is under such intense scrutiny is that bin Laden was in many respects a creation of the Saudi intelligence community when the Saudis were actively supporting Islamic fighters during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan during the 1980s. As the head of Saudi intelligence during that period, Prince Turki had several meetings with bin Laden, although he firmly rejects any suggestion that he has had dealings with the al-Qa'eda leader since he founded the terror group in the early 1990s.

(snip)

Although Prince Turki stepped down as Saudi Arabia's intelligence chief on September 1, 2001, just 10 days before the World Trade Center attacks, he remains deeply sceptical about Saddam's alleged links with both weapons of mass destruction and bin Laden's al-Qa'eda network.

(more)

<http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/08/03/wbin03.xml>

these are the only two paragraphs that might be of interest. It says that the Saudis were responsible for al Queda not that our gov't had anything to do with it, and that this guy stepped down just before 9/11