Pakistani forces were on Thursday night poised for a dawn assault on a mountain stronghold that officials in the capital, Islamabad, said could be the hideout of Ayman al-Zawahiri, al-Qaeda’s deputy leader.
Pakistani military operations against the fortified compound in Waziristan province were suspended overnight, but were due to resume at first light, possibly with the use of air strikes against 200 heavily armed militants.
President Pervez Musharraf had earlier said that Pakistani army leaders believed they had a senior figure cornered, because of the ferocity of the resistance being offered by al-Qaeda militants.
Senior Pakistani officials later told journalists that they believed the encircled al-Qaeda leader was Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden’s Egyptian deputy, ideological mentor and personal doctor.
”[Because of] the resistance being offered by the people there, we feel that there may be a high-value target,” President Musharraf told CNN television. ”They are not coming out, in spite of the fact we are pounding them with artillery.
”I spoke to the corps commander just now. The net is there … They see very strong dug-in positions. The houses actually there are forts. They are mud forts. All these forts are occupied and they are dug in, and they are giving fierce resistance. So we’re sure there is a high-value target there.”
US officials said American forces were not involved in the operation, but were deployed just across the border in Afghanistan.
A White House official said there was no independent confirmation that Zawahiri was in the compound. ”This is 100% a Pakistani operation. We’ll have to wait and see,” the official said.
A Pakistani intelligence source said he could not rule out air strikes after daybreak if resistance continued. The battle was the biggest so far between Pakistani forces and al-Qaeda.
However, Peter Bergen, the author of a book on al-Qaida, Holy War Inc, said the scale of the fighting did not necessarily signify that one of the group’s leaders was involved in the battle. ”This is the first time the Pakistanis have really taken the battle to al-Qaeda. It’s not surprising that they’re fighting,” Bergen said. ”These guys have nowhere to go and they’re prepared to martyr themselves.”
However, he said that if Zawahiri was captured alive, Bin Laden might be next. ”They’re so close that if you’ve got one of them, you would be very close to getting the other.”
The development came at the start of a visit to Pakistan by the US secretary of state, Colin Powell, but US administration officials on Thursday said they could not confirm the Pakistani claim. The US has offered a $25-million reward for information leading to Zawahiri’s capture.
The battle, involving helicopter gunships and heavy artillery, came shortly after Pakistan launched an offensive in the autonomous ”tribal areas” along the Afghan border. Much of the fighting has taken place around the town of Wana and involved Pakistani special forces and paramilitary troops.
US and Pakistani officials have denied the involvement of US special forces in operations in Pakistan. Officially they were confining their work to Afghanistan.
In a battle in the area on Tuesday, 39 people were killed in a Pakistani military raid on suspected Taliban and al-Qaeda fighters in a fortified compound in Kaloosha.
Pakistan forces claimed to have killed 24 suspected guerrillas, with the loss of 15 Pakistani soldiers.
Intelligence officers were reported to be questioning 18 people captured during the raids who may have led them to the stronghold at the focus of Thursday’s fighting.
Shortly before news of the siege emerged, the US formally declared Pakistan one of its most important allies outside Nato, in a step likely to open the door to more US arms sales to the country.
For weeks there have been suggestions that troops were closing in on Bin Laden. And American forces are reportedly planning a ”spring offensive” against al-Qaeda, using special forces and state of the art surveillance devices.
Most security experts agree that Zawahri is unlikely to be taken alive. As mentor to Bin Laden and the brains behind al-Qaeda, he is considered to be one of the world’s most dangerous terrorists.
An eye surgeon who speaks several languages, he took the path of political extremism while in his teens. He later guided the rich Saudi, Bin Laden, along the same path, leading to the creation of the world’s most feared and effective terrorist organisation.
Many believe that Zawahri was the ”operational brains” behind the attacks on the US on September 11 2001. He is also thought to have been behind the 1995 suicide bombings at the Egyptian embassy in Pakistan, where 15 died and 60 more were injured, and the 1998 bombings at the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998, killing 224 people and injuring thousands more. – Guardian Unlimited Â