Jerusalem Post

NEW YORK-An Iraqi intelligence agent who met with suspected September 11 hijacker Mohammed Atta six months ago in Prague helped devise the terrorist tactics that downed the World Trade Center and part of the Pentagon, according to an Iraqi opposition group.

According to an official at the Iraqi National Congress in Washington, the terrorist plot was hatched by Farouk Al-Hijazi, Iraq's current ambassador to Turkey and former brigadier-general at the General Intelligence Directorate, and Brig.-Gen. Habib Al-Ma'amouri of the GID.

"The plan of controlling a civilian airplane with full fuel tanks by teams of five using items that can be easily carried aboard a plane such as knives and then using the plane as a guided missile was hatched by Al-Ma'amouri and Hijazi ... some time before 1995," said the INC official.

-- Rachel Gibson (rgibson@hotmail.com), October 13, 2001