WASHINGTON — The United States on Wednesday laid out in great detail its case linking Iraq to the Al Qaeda network, saying that Saddam Hussein developed a newfound respect for the terrorist organization after admiring its success in bombing two U.S. embassies in Africa and an American warship.
Though some U.S. and European counter-terrorism experts have insisted that the devoutly fundamentalist Al Qaeda and the secular government in Iraq are hostile to each other, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said in his speech to the United Nations that the two have enjoyed a discreet relationship for at least a decade, fueled by a shared opposition to the United States.
"Ambition and hatred are enough to bring Iraq and Al Qaeda together," Powell said.
In recent months, that alliance has intensified to the point where Iraq -- after providing Al Qaeda members with training on the development of chemical weapons -- allowed a top Al Qaeda chemical weapons expert and two dozen of his associates to operate with impunity within its borders, Powell said.
From its base in Iraq, Powell said, Abu Musab Zarqawi and his Al Qaeda cell have become affiliated with Ansar al-Islam, a Taliban-style religious group, and plotted the assassination of a U.S. aid worker in Jordan.
Sending a pointed message to skeptics in France and other European countries, Powell used a chart to trace the alleged ties linking the Iraqi regime, Zarqawi and people arrested recently in Paris, London and Spain on suspicion of plotting attacks with cyanide gas and ricin, deadly poisons.
"Saddam was a supporter of terrorism long before these terrorist networks had a name, and this support continues," Powell said. "The nexus of poisons and terror is new; the nexus of Iraq and terror is old. The combination is lethal."
Iraqi officials and Ansar al-Islam leaders immediately denied the accusations, saying in separate news conferences that Powell was fabricating any links between them and Al Qaeda.
"Neither I nor anybody in our group has ever seen or met" Zarqawi, Ansar al-Islam leader Mullah Krekar told reporters in Norway, where he lives. He also denied that Hussein had any influence on the group, calling the Iraqi president "an enemy of me and my people."
In his speech, Powell said such denials were to be expected and that they were "simply not credible."
