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US missile strike misses al-Qaeda No. 2, kills 18

A US airstrike that killed at least 18 people in a Pakistani border village targeted al-Qaeda's No. 2 Ayman al-Zawahri, but the suspect wasn't there, Pakistani officials said yesterday.

Two senior Pakistani officials said that the CIA had acted on incorrect information in launching the attack early on Friday in the northwestern village of Dalamoda, near the Afghan border.

Citing unnamed US intelligence officials, US networks reported that al-Zawahri, Osama bin Laden's top lieutenant, could have been at a compound targeted in the attack or about to arrive.

"Their information was wrong, and our investigations conclude that they acted on false information," said a senior intelligence official who has direct knowledge of the investigations launched by Pakistan to look into the attack. His account was confirmed by a senior government official who said al-Zawahri "was not there."

Pakistan's government was expected to formally issue its reaction late yesterday.

Like bin Laden, al-Zawahri is believed to have been hiding along the rugged Pakistan-Afghan frontier since the Sept. 11 attacks on the US. He has a US$25 million US government bounty on his head.

There was no confirmation from either Islamabad or Washington on the reports about the airstrike, but a Pakistani intelligence official said that the CIA had told Pakistani agents that they had targeted al-Zawahri.

A reporter who visited Damadola about 12 hours after the attack saw three destroyed houses, hundreds of yards apart. Villagers had buried at least 15 people, including women and children, and were digging for more bodies in the rubble.

Villagers denied hosting al-Zawahri or any other al-Qaeda or Taliban figure, and said all the dead were local people.

Yesterday, more than 8,000 tribesmen staged a peaceful protest in a nearby town to condemn the airstrike, which one speaker described as "open terrorism." Police dispersed a smaller protest in another town using tear gas.

US and Pakistani officials told NBC news that US predator drones had fired as many as 10 missiles at Damadola in the Bajur tribal region of northwestern Pakistan. ABC quoted anonymous Pakistani military sources as saying al-Zawahri could have been among five top al-Qaeda officials believed killed.

The second Pakistani intelligence official said the remains of some bodies had "quickly been removed" from Damadola after the strike and DNA tests were being conducted, but would not say by whom.

Shah Zaman, a tribesman whose home was destroyed but survived the attack, denied hosting any terrorists and said no officials had taken bodies away.

"I don't know him [al-Zawahri]. He was not at my home. No foreigner was at my home when the planes came and dropped bombs," he said.

Local lawmaker Sahibzada Haroon ur Rashid, who visited Damadola soon after the attack, said the dead had already been buried, and claimed no foreigners were among them. They came from a local family of jewelers, he said, adding that none of the bodies had been burnt or charred beyond recognition that would make identification difficult.

Major General Shaukat Sultan, the spokesman for President General Pervez Musharraf, a key ally in the US-led war on terrorism, only said the explosions in the village, which lies about 200km northwest of the capital, Islamabad, were under investigation. He gave no details.

In Washington, Pentagon, State Department, National Security Council and intelligence officials all said they had no information on the reports concerning al-Zawahri.
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