Iraq conflict feeds international terror threat says CIA

WASHINGTON - Islamic militants waging a deadly insurgency against US-led forces in Iraq pose an emerging international terrorism threat, CIA Director Porter Goss said today.

In his first public appearance as US spymaster, Goss described Iraqi insurgents, including al Qaeda ally Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, as part of a Sunni militant movement inspired by Osama bin Laden and intent on attacking Americans.

"The Iraq conflict, while not a cause of extremism, has become a cause for extremists," Goss told the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.

"Those jihadists who survive will leave Iraq experienced in and focused on acts of urban terrorism. They represent a potential pool of contacts to build transnational terrorist cells, groups and networks in Saudi Arabia, Jordan and other countries," he said.

US President George W Bush, who portrays US-led actions in Iraq as the leading edge of democratic reform in the Middle East, cited Iraqi backing for international terrorism as a reason for the 2003 invasion.

However, a top level US inquiry found last year that there had in fact been no collaboration between al Qaeda and Iraq under President Saddam Hussein.

Bush critics say the invasion was a distraction from the global war against terrorism declared after the Sept 11, 2001 attacks by al Qaeda on the United States and has stirred up a violent response in Iraq that inflamed further terrorism.

"These sentences indicate Goss is very much listening to what his analysts are saying, and not necessarily to what the White House wants to hear," said Kenneth Katzman, terrorism analyst for the Congressional Research Service.

"Zarqawi has sought to bring about the final victory of Islam over the West, and he hopes to establish a safe haven in Iraq from which his group could operate against 'infidel' Western nations and 'apostate' Muslim governments," Goss said.

Presenting the CIA's annual "threat assessment," Goss also said insurgents achieved some of their goals in the January 30 Iraqi elections by keeping Sunni Arab voter turnout low.

A long-time intelligence officer and former chairman of the House of Representatives intelligence committee, Goss took over the CIA last year with a mandate to reform the premier US spy agency after huge lapses in the run-up to the Sept. 11 attacks and the 2003 Iraq invasion.

His predecessor, George Tenet, resigned amid widespread criticism over flawed intelligence about the threat from Iraq that critics say was exaggerated to meet a political agenda.

Goss told the lawmakers that US authorities and their allies had dealt "serious blows" to the al Qaeda network.

"Despite these successes, however, the terrorist threat to the US in the homeland and abroad endures," he said in an assessment that differed little from last year's report.

Goss was one of several top officials to appear before the Senate committee, which is scrutinizing US intelligence on Iran, North Korea and other hot spots in hopes of avoiding mistakes committed before the war on Iraq.

FBI Director Robert Mueller testified al Qaeda remained intent on attacking the United States, likely by using low-tech methods of the kind employed in 2001 when terrorists killed about 3000 people after hijacking airliners with box-cutters.

Goss said al Qaeda or another group would likely try to eclipse the Sept 11 attacks by using nuclear, chemical or biological weapons that authorities say could be stolen or purchased from nations such as North Korea.

Officials also warned that North Korea, which declared last week that it had nuclear arms, could soon be ready to test a new long-range nuclear-capable missile which could hit targets across North America.

Private analysts doubt North Korea could pose a direct threat to the US mainland any time soon.

- REUTERS