The Pentagon said Friday that it has taken custody of one of al Qaeda's most senior members, an operational commander who had been active in Afghanistan and Pakistan.Defense Department and U.S. intelligence officials would not say precisely when or where Abdul Hadi al-Iraqi was captured, or by whom, only that he was headed for his home country of Iraq when detained. Officials said al-Iraqi was handed over to the CIA in late 2006 and has been providing critically important information about al Qaeda.
"This was a very important capture. He was one of al Qaeda's highest-ranking and experienced senior operatives," said U.S. Army Col. Gary Keck, a Pentagon spokesman. "He had been one of the organization's key paramilitary commanders in Afghanistan, and we know he was in direct communication" with al Qaeda's second-in-command, Ayman al-Zawahiri, and perhaps Osama bin Laden.
Officials did not disclose where the CIA had held al-Iraqi since he was captured. It wasn't until last September that President Bush first acknowledged the CIA's use of secret prisons around the world. He said all 14 high-value terrorism suspects that the CIA had been holding had been transferred to military custody at the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, for trials.
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