Originally posted by dilloduck
couldn't find it--a clue please?
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationw...ia_lat,1,6226208.story?coll=la-home-headlines
By Kim Murphy, Times Staff Writer
MOSCOW — Lending support to the Bush administration's claim of a connection between Iraq and Al Qaeda, Russian President Vladimir V. Putin said today that Russian intelligence received several reports before the war with Iraq that Saddam Hussein's regime was planning terrorist attacks against U.S. targets.
In a move whose timing is widely seen in Russian political circles as an attempt to support Bush's reelection, Putin said Russian agents received information after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks that Iraqi agents were plotting strikes against other U.S. targets, both at home and abroad.
"After the events of Sept. 11, 2001, and before the start of the military operation in Iraq, Russian special services several times received information that the official services of the Saddam regime were preparing terrorist acts on the United States, and beyond its borders against the U.S. military and other interests," Putin told reporters during a visit to the former Soviet republic of Kazakhstan.
"This information was passed on to our American colleagues," he said.
But Putin said Russia had no reason to believe that Iraq had engineered any attacks.
The Russian president's confirmation comes a day after an unnamed Russian intelligence officer made a similar revelation to the Interfax news agency. That officer was critical of the report this week from the U.S. commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks, which found there was "no credible evidence" that Iraq and Al Qaeda cooperated in attacks against the United States. It said reports of contacts between the two did not appear to have resulted in a "collaborative relationship."