Bin Laden denounces United Nations By FT.com staff Published: November 3 2001 14:53 | Last Updated: November 3 2001 15:19
Osama bin Laden on Saturday launched a scathing attack on the United Nations blaming it for all the "tragedies" of the Arab and Muslim people, and labelled those Arab leaders who co-operated with it "infidels".
Meanwhile the Taliban claimed that its forces had shot down the US helicopter which the Pentagon had earlier confirmed had crashed in bad weather on Friday night.
Mr bin Laden's latest intervention in the propaganda war that has complemented the US response to the attacks of September 11 came in a statement televised by al-Jazeera the Qatari satellite news channel.
"The United Nations is a crime tool, are any of our tragedies not the making of the United Nations?" Mr bin Laden asked, warning Arab leaders not to co-operate with the UN.
The Saudi-born dissident's statement also said there was no evidence linking the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington with Afghanistan.
As American attacks on Afghanistan continued on Saturday there was claim and counter-claim surrounidng the circumstances in which a US helicopter crashed on Friday evening.
Qari Fazil Rabi, a Taliban information ministry spokesman, told Reuters that Taliban forces had shot down a US helicopter on operation to the south of Kabul, killing up to 50 US servicemen.
"You can see the bodies of the Americans on board the helicopter with their uniforms," he said.
Pentagon officials maintained their policy of not commenting on Taliban claims, and merely referred back to the statement made on Friday night, in which they said a helicopter had crashed in severe weather conditions in Afghanistan, injuring four crew members who were subsequently rescued.
The helicopter was subsequently destroyed by F-14 Tomcat fighter aircraft to prevent the salvage of any useful equipment by enemy forces, the Pentagon reported.
In the northern theatre of the war, where opposition forces are fighting the Taliban, the Northern Alliance said it had captured a region to the south west of the important strategic city of Mazra e Sharif.
The claim from the Northern Alliance, which has not been independently confirmed, follows several days of heavy raids in the region by US forces.
On Saturday those US forces shifted the focus of their attack back to the Taliban frontline north of Kabul. Witnesses reported the attacks were delivered by fighters rather than the heavy bombers which have been used in recent days.
On the diplomatic front, Donald Rumsfeld, the US defence secretary, spent eight hours in Moscow on the first leg of a tour of central Asia, meeting President Vladimir Putin and his defence counterpart Sergei Ivanov.
Although Russia again ruled out any direct participation in the US military campaign, Mr Ivanov hinted that Russia would play some role, thought to be in the intelligence arena.
"To a large part it concerns Russia's use of special services and here I cannot comment any further," said Ivanov.
Mr Putin was keen to emphasise the strengthening relationship between the two countries, 10 days before his own summit with President Bush in 10 days time.
"After the meeting with the U.S. President in Shanghai we witnessed a further rapprochement between the power structures including special services," Mr Putin said.
Mr Rumsfeld is to travel on to Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Pakistan.