The US Federal Bureau of Investigation expanded the list of people wanted in connection with terrorist attacks to nearly 200 late Tuesday, as the CIA pored over reports that one of the suspects in the plot had a meeting with an Iraqi intelligence official.
The updated list has been sent to local police stations, border crossings and US airlines in hope of getting hold of the individuals that officials said could be helpful to the probe, an FBI official said.
But the investigation acquired a new dimension, when the Central Intelligence Agency began looking into reports that one of the hijackers, who took part in last week's terrorist attacks, met with a senior Iraqi intelligence official prior to them, a US government source told AFP.
"There is an indication that such a meeting occurred earlier this year in Europe," the source said.
The hijacker in question was Mohammed Atta, the man believed to have been inside an American Airlines plane that was the first to crash into the World Trade Center, according to the source.
But at the moment, the CIA was not certain the meeting "had anything to do with Tuesday's events," the source said.
US Attorney General John Ashcroft refused any comment when asked Tuesday about a possible Iraqi connection. "I wouldn't be in a position to discuss evidence in regard to questions about other responsible parties," he said.
The attacks, in which two jet airliners crashed into the twin towers of the World Trade Center, have left at least 5,600 missing and presumed dead.
A third hijacked plane struck the Pentagon outside Washington, and a fourth crashed in a field in the state of Pennsylvania after its passengers apparently forcefully resisted the hijackers.
One full week after the tragedy, investigators were questioning 75 people detained for immigration violations as they pursued more that 96,000 leads in hopes to figure out the full scope of the plot.
Administration officials have warned that members of the terrorist conspiracy may still be on the loose on US soil and could strike again.
Meanwhile federal prosecutors impaneled a grand jury in White Planes, New York, to make it easier to subpoena people and documents, according to law enforcement sources.
In Texas, FBI agents have raided a flight school in the city Arlington seeking information about a man they had removed from a train in Fort Worth, The Dallas Morning News reported.
They were inquiring about Ayub Ali Khan, arrested last Thursday along with an individual named Mohammed Jaweed Azmath during a drug sweep at a Forth Worth train station. The two men were travelling to San Antonio, the report said.
The men had $5,000 in cash as well as box cutters, the weapon used by the hijackers to take control of the planes, according to police.
Khan reportedly had a outstanding deportation order against him before he was detained. Both and he and Azmath were taken to New York for questioning, according to law enforcement sources.
The two were held in New York together with a San Antonio, Texas, resident named Albader Al-Hazmi, a radiologist from Saudi Arabia, who worked at the University of Texas Health Science Center, according to the Dallas Morning News.
Federal investigators are also pursuing a lead in Southern California, said an official without providing specifics.
The San-Diego Union-Tribune reported that a unidentified San Diego resident suspected of financially aiding Nawaf Alhamzi and Khalid Al-Midhar, two of the alleged hijackers, had been taken into custody late Sunday.
In Boston, federal agents have searched an apartment complex which is home to relatives of Osama bin Laden, the Saudi-born exile named the main suspect in the terrorist attacks, the Boston Herald reported Wednesday.
The agents arrived at the Flagship Wharf condominium complex hours after the attacks, according to the paper, which said that at least two bin Laden relatives -- Mohammed bin Laden and Nawaf bin Laden -- currently own units in the complex.
In Detroit, the FBI arrested three men after allegedly finding them with false identification papers and notes about a US military base in Turkey, according to media reports -- WASHINGTON (AFP)
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