Bin Laden Tape Slams Democracy, Advocates Conversion to Islam

World | September 8, 2007, Saturday // 00:00
Bin Laden Tape Slams Democracy, Advocates Conversion to Islam A still image of the tape, which has been transcripted by SITE Institute, a group monitoring islamist websites. Photo by telegraph.co.uk

Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden criticised democracy in his most recent videotape, inviting Americans to convert to Islam, but made no specific threats against the US.

The tape was released on the eve of the sixth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks and almost three years since bin Laden's previous video.

In a short excerpt aired by al-Jazeera, he criticises America for voting George W. Bush into a second term at the White House, thus not taking to account the main culprit of the war in Iraq.

As a result, Islamic militants will continue to "escalate the killing and fighting", according to a transcript quoted by Bloomberg, although Americans are given the choice of speeding up the end of the war by converting to Islam.

"It has now become clear to you and the entire world the impotence of the democratic system and how it plays with the interest of the peoples and their blood by sacrificing soldiers and populations to achieve the interests of the major corporations. I invite you to embrace Islam," he says.

A US intelligence official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said initial analysis confirmed it was bin Laden on the tape and was made this summer, with the world's most wanted terrorist passing comment on current affairs, such as Gordon Brown taking over as British Prime Minister and Nicolas Sarkozy winning the presidential elections in France.

The tape was released on the same day the CIA director, Michael Hayden, defended the agency's program of detaining terrorist suspects in jails abroad, some of them in eastern Europe, and subjecting them to harsh interrogation, which human rights groups have branded as outright torture.

He also reiterated the danger posed by the organisation, which is planning "high-impact plots" on US soil. "Al-Qaeda is focusing on targets that would produce mass casualties, dramatic destruction and significant economic aftershocks," Hayden added.

Bin Laden is thought to be hiding on the mountainous border between Pakistan and Afghanistan, but has so far eluded all efforts to capture him, prompting the US to double the bounty on his head to USD 50 M in July.

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