Kuala Lumpur al-Qaeda Summit

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The 2000 al-Qaeda Summit was a meeting of several high-level al-Qaeda members held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.^[1]^[2]

The meeting was held in the hotel room of Yazid Sufaat, a former army captain and businessman, in a hotel in Kuala Lumpur. The meeting lasted from January 5 to January 8, 2000. The summit's purpose was allegedly to plan future attacks, which apparently included the October 2000 bombing of the USS Cole and the 9/11 plot. The attendance consisted of Arab veterans of the Soviet war in Afghanistan, including Hambali, Ramzi Binalshibh, Nawaf al-Hazmi, Khalid al-Mihdhar, and Tawfiq bin Attash.

Before the meeting, the United States intercepted a telephone call to Yemen by al-Mihdhar concerning arrangements for the trip. Osama bin Laden had called that number dozens of times. By request of the CIA, the Malaysian authorities videotaped the meeting, but no sound recordings were made. The men were also photographed when they came out of the meeting. U.S. investigators did not identify these men until much later. That Binalshibh attended the meeting was discovered by the investigators by looking into his credit card records. Sufaat was later arrested, but he denied that he knew any of the men and told that Hambali had arranged the meeting.