Osama bin Laden, the man sus-pected by the US of orchestrating the worst terrorist atrocity in history, yesterday denied any involvement in last week's attacks on New York and Washington.
"The US is pointing the finger at me but I categorically state that I have not done this," bin Laden said in a statement faxed to the Pakistan-based Afghan Islamic Press (AIP) news agency.
"Those who have done it, they have done it in their personal interest," bin Laden said in the statement, which AIP said had been sent to them by bin Laden's aide Abdul Samad.
It was the first time that the former Saudi citizen had issued a personal denial of any involvement in the attacks. Previous denials have been issued by unidentified aides or by officials of the Taliban, the Islamic militia which controls most of Afghanistan and has harbored bin Laden since 1996.
It came a day after US President George W. Bush declared that US was at war with the "barbarians" responsible for the terror strikes and called bin Laden a "prime suspect."
Bush promised "sweeping, sustained, and effective" retaliation for the attacks and issued a direct warning to bin Laden.
"If he thinks he can hide and run from the United States and our allies, he will be sorely mistaken," Bush said.
Bin Laden said he did not have the means to organize terrorist attacks because of restrictions placed on his contacts with the outside world by Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar.
"I'm living in Afghanistan. I'm a follower of Amir Ul-Momineen [Omar] who does not allow me to participate in such activities," said the statement, which was written in bin Laden's native language, Arabic.
AIP is a private news agency but has close contacts with the Taliban.
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