Bin Laden urging al Qaeda to invest in infrastructure?

CNN) -- A message purportedly from al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden is urging Muslims to tackle famine, flood relief, and clean water -- stark problems plaguing parts of the Islamic world.
The message, which appeared on jihadist forums Friday, strongly urged Muslims to help Muslims by investing in infrastructure projects and developing awareness programs, such as how to deal with issues like water pollution.

The speaker started the message by wishing the Muslim world a happy Ramadan, which fell between early August and early September, and he also focused on the floods in Pakistan.
The speech, entitled, "Pauses with the Method of Relief Work," came in an 11 minute, 39 second video produced by al-Qaeda's media arm, as-Sahab.
CNN could not verify the authenticity of the message.

The video featured a still photo of bin Laden with alternating images of people in disaster zones receiving aid over the voice of the speaker.
A purported bin Laden tape surfaced in March. The voice on that tape hints at retaliation if alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is executed.

Meet the new boss - same as the old boss.

North Korean has released video footage and a photograph which appears to show the heir apparent Kim Jong-un.

It is the world's first up-to-date glimpse of the young man who appears set to succeed his father, Kim Jong-il, in a gradual transfer of power.

He is pictured sitting on the front row in a group shot of senior leaders.

The TV footage shows him at this week's rare meeting of the ruling Workers' Party, where he was promoted to top political and military positions.

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Kim Jong-un, who is thought to be about 27 years old, was named vice-chairman of the Central Military Commission of the Workers' Party and was appointed to its central committee, state media said.

Mr Kim was also given the rank of a four-star general.

Kim Jong-il, thought to be in poor health, was re-elected as leader at the party's first congress for 30 years.

A North Korean delegation has now gone to China, reportedly to brief officials about the meeting.

Rapid rise
One day after the historic conference drew to a close, North Korea state television screened pictures of the event.

The leader's son, Kim Jong-un can be seen applauding along with the other senior officials.

It's a somewhat pudgy one, showing as we'd expect a young man much better fed than the overwhelming majority of his fellow countrymen.

Kim Jong-un's remarkable, rapid promotion this week to senior military and political office has already been reported - his first ever mention by name - in North Korea's government-controlled press.

But his special family connection has not been made clear. Now, for your average North Korean poring over the group photograph of the assembled officials, the symbolism won't need to be explained.

Kim Jong-un's front-row proximity to his father, as well as the clear family likeness, makes it all too clear.

Here is the chosen successor, with for good measure, the backing of the military, represented by a stern-faced officer in the middle.

Kim Jong-un's remarkable rise
The official photograph was published on the front page of a state-controlled North Korean newspaper, the Rodong Sinmun.

It showed 200 officials at the Workers' Party convention. Seated in the front row, just two seats along from his father, is Kim Jong-un.

Although the caption did not identify him, state media reported that he had attended the photo session.

Previously only grainy images from his childhood have been seen in the West.

The BBC's John Sudworth in Seoul says the family likeness is clear, and North Koreans, seeing the photo for the first time, are unlikely to miss the significance.

Kim Jong-un is Kim Jong-il's third son and had already been identified as the most likely successor to the Communist dynasty started by his grandfather, Kim Il-sung, in 1948.

Our correspondent says his rise is remarkable, even by the standards of one of the world's most totalitarian states.

He says there can now be little doubt that Swiss-educated Kim Jong-un has been chosen to eventually take over from his ailing father, who is thought to have had a stroke in 2008.

The few still photographs released from the conference hall show Kim Jong-il apparently chairing proceedings.

Analysts say that, at least, confirms that, although thin and frail, he is well enough to attend and seemingly still in control.

Hotel with one helluva view!

A Russian company has unveiled an ambitious plan to launch a "cosmic hotel" for wealthy space tourists. Guests would be ferried to the hotel on a Soyuz shuttle of the type used to transport cosmonauts to the International Space Station (ISS).

The Moscow-based firm did not reveal how the hotel would be built or funded.

Up until now space tourists, such as American businessman Dennis Tito, have squeezed into the cramped ISS, alongside astronauts and their experiments.

The new hotel would offer greater comforts, according to Sergei Kostenko, chief executive of Orbital Technologies.

High flyers
"Our planned module inside will not remind you of the ISS. A hotel should be comfortable inside, and it will be possible to look at the Earth through large portholes," he told RIA Novosti.

The hotel would be aimed at wealthy individuals and people working for private companies who want to do research in space, Mr Kostenko said.

It would follow the same orbit as the International Space Station.

The first module would have four cabins, designed for up to seven passengers, who would be packed into a space of 20 cubic metres (706 cubic feet).

Mr Kostenko did not reveal the price of staying in the hotel.

However he did say that food would be suited to individual preferences, and that organisers were thinking of employing celebrity chefs to cook the meals before they were sent into space.

It is not clear how the "cosmic hotel" would be built, but the company's website names Energia, Russia's state-controlled spacecraft manufacturer, as the project's general contractor.

Energia builds the Soyuz capsules and Progress cargo ships which deliver crew and supplies to the ISS.

Mr Kostenko said that "a number of agreements on partnership have already been signed" with Energia and the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos).

The project has Russian and American investors willing to inject hundreds of millions of dollars, he added.

Alexey Krasnov, head of manned space missions at Roscosmos, told the Associated Press news agency the proposed hotel could provide a temporary haven for the crew of the ISS, in case of an emergency.

However, doubts about the project were raised by Jim Oberg, a Houston-based space consultant and expert on the Russian space program.

"Why Russia would spend the required funds is a compelling question that has significant implications for its future commitment to the ISS," he told AP.

This latest plan is not the first time a space hotel has been mooted.

In 2009 the Barcelona-based architects of The Galactic Suite Space Resort said their orbiting hotel was on target to accept its first paying guests by 2012.

In 2007, Genesis II, an experimental spacecraft designed to test the viability of a space hotel, was successfully sent into orbit by Bigelow Aerospace, a private company founded by an American hotel tycoon.

Wannabee terrorist planned second bomb.

A new video has emerged of the man convicted of the Times Square bomb plot

A man convicted of an attempted bomb attack in New York's Times Square said he planned to detonate a second bomb two weeks later, prosecutors say.

Faisal Shahzad also said he thought the first bomb, which failed to go off, would kill at least 40 people, prosecutors say in new court documents.

They argue Shahzad, a Pakistani-born US citizen, should be given a life term when he is sentenced, due on 5 October.

Shahzad pleaded guilty in June to 10 weapons and terrorism charges.

In the court documents, prosecutors say Shahzad left the US in 2009 to learn how to build bombs and attack targets in the US.

"I have been trying to join my brothers in jihad since 9/11 happened. I am planning to wage an attack inside America," Shahzad said in a 40-minute video released by prosecutors on Wednesday.

'A terrorising strike'

In the video, the 30-year-old fires a machine gun and says he has met members of the Pakistani Taliban and has decided "to raise an attack inside America".

The government said Shahzad had not shown any remorse when he pleaded guilty after confessing to the attempted bombing.

Prosecutors wrote that the financial analyst "spoke with pride about what he and his co-conspirators had done".

They argued Shahzad had "every intention of delivering a powerful and terrorising strike to the heart of New York City".

Shahzad was arrested two days after the attempted 1 May bomb attack in busy Times Square, where the explosives he had packed into the back of a vehicle failed to detonate.

The plot thickens ...

LONDON, England (CNN) -- A deadly plan uncovered by Western intelligence services to attack targets across Europe could indicate a change in tactics by al Qaeda, security analysts say.

German intelligence officials say much of the information about the plot has come from a German citizen with suspected links to al Qaeda who was detained in Kabul in July and handed over to U.S. forces.

The officials say he has spoken of a plan similar to the 2008 assault on the Indian city of Mumbai and had told interrogators the plan had the blessing of Osama bin Laden.

In that attack, spread over three days, more than 160 people were killed as 10 men attacked and occupied a number of prominent buildings including the Taj Mahal Palace and Tower and Oberoi-Trident hotels, the city's Victoria Terminus train station, and the Jewish cultural center, Chabad House.

India blamed the attacks on the Lashkar-e-Tayyiba, a Pakistan-based terror group allied with al Qaeda.

With al Qaeda struggling to replicate attacks on the scale of the devastation witnessed on September 11, 2001 in New York and Washington, security experts believe the Mumbai attack, which gained worldwide publicity, may provide the template for its future operations.

"This new plot is perhaps an indication that al Qaeda is trying to change its strategy," said CNN's Senior International Correspondent Nic Robertson. "The high-profile attacks that it has always liked using explosives are clearly getting harder and harder to perpetrate.

"The cells are being spotted and it's harder to keep undercover when you're making bombs. Even buying the material to make bombs is getting harder, so many analysts believe al Qaeda would be unable to mount a 9/11-style attack in the current climate.
Video: Clinton: Al Qaeda wants to attack Video: Terror threats shift to soft targets

"Therefore Mumbai would have been viewed as successful by the al Qaeda leadership as it killed a large number of people. This type of attack is just as deadly but harder to stop."
In the last year, a number of plots targeting the West have been foiled, including the failed Christmas Day bombing of a U.S. airliner; the failed car bomb attempt in New York City's Times Square and an alleged plan to attack shopping malls in Manchester, England over one holiday weekend in 2009.


CNN Terrorism Consultant Paul Cruickshank says Western intelligence officials are extremely worried about a Mumbai-style attack if al Qaeda chooses "softer" economic targets.
"We're so vulnerable in Europe and the United States," he said. "Guns and ammunition can be concealed easily. They may be harder to access in Europe, but not impossible on the black market."

Last week, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano told the Senate Homeland Security Committee that the terrorism threat against the United States has evolved, with homegrown terrorists and a greater diversity in the scope and methods of attack -- making it more difficult to prevent them.

"It is diversifying in terms of sources; it is diversifying in terms of tactics," she said. "The results of these changing tactics are fewer opportunities to detect and disrupt plots."

Al Qaeda's hideouts in the tribal areas that straddle the Pakistan-Afghanistan border have come under greater pressure.
Operations by the Pakistani Army have forced the group into a diminishing area; and the much expanded U.S. drone campaign has disrupted its operations and killed senior figures. But enough of the leadership remains at large and it is a supremely adaptive organization.

"They're down but not out," warned Cruickshank. "Osama bin Laden most definitely signed off on this operation and this is a major fact to bear in mind.
"This is interesting because there has been little in recent times to pinpoint his role in various plots. So he's still in charge, he's still the strategic driving force but not the details guy.

"They may go to him for the big decisions but the detailed operations will be taken care of by people under him who have risen through the ranks in tribal areas of Pakistan, where it has its center, or have come recently from Europe or the U.S."

This diversification has also meant forging links with groups around the world that share al Qaeda's anti-western and jihadist ideology, such as al Shabaab in Somalia and Pakistan's Lashkar-e-Tayyiba.
"Al Shabaab is involved in a nationalist struggle in Somalia but has already shown it is willing to strike outside its borders with the recent attack in Uganda," said Robertson. "It has attracted people from the U.S. to go there and join the fight and al Qaeda would like to turn many of them around, creating a wider potential threat there."

Despite a number of failed plots, al Qaeda has retained a command structure -- and has a external operations chief planning operations around the world. U.S. officials say evidence of this emerged in the case of Najibullah Zazi, a U.S. resident, who this year confessed to a plot to carry out suicide bombings in the New York City subway.

U.S. officials allege that a senior al Qaeda handler, Adnan El Shukrijumah, recruited Zazi to conduct suicide bombings in the city with bombs made of hydrogen peroxide, acetone, and high explosive detonators.

An accomplice also confessed to being involved in the plot; a third man is due to go on trial in New York also accused of involvement. Prosecutors allege all three went to Pakistan and received training in making bombs at al Qaeda camps. Shukrijumah is a U.S. citizen who had lived in New York and Florida.

"Even though many al Qaeda plots failed, they have shown they can still send personnel to western countries, said Cruickshank. "The feeling is some attacks will eventually get through. Al Qaeda may be smaller now but they are still very capable of launching deadly attacks."