'Al-Qaida hatched 9/11 style attack on Kabul'

London, July 30 (ANI): Leaked US military intelligence documents published by the 'WikiLeaks' website have revealed that Al-Qaida masterminds behind 9/11 attack on New York and Washington hatched similar type of attack on Afghanistan's capital Kabul.

"During the flight they will hijack the plane and conduct attacks in Kabul," The Guardian quoted the report, as saying.

Al-Qaida's second in command Ayman al-Zawahiri, is said to have given the order for a team of 22 to board one or more planes at Kabul airport, hijack the aircraft and steer them toward a number of "important objectives".

They aimed to target Afghan President Hamid Karzai's presidential palace, Nato headquarters, the British and US embassies and the Ariana hotel.

The report on the alleged hijack plot, recorded by intelligence officers on 23 March 2009, highlights the mixed quality of western intelligence, particularly the large number of "threat reports" fed to coalition forces each day, there are almost 2,500 for Kabul alone in the five-year period covered by the logs, the paper states.

The airline plot report named a number of conspirators, including Afghan, Pakistani generals and a pilot from the Afghan national carrier, who were allegedly involved in providing the hijackers fake IDs and "facilitating anti-coalition training".

Unlike the 9/11 hijackers, who went to flight schools in Arizona and Florida, the Kabul plotters were due to receive flying lessons at a "private air club in Karachi."

The details of the plot came to light as the leak of secret intelligence continues to create controversy in Kabul and Washington owing to the large number of references alleging that Pakistan's spy agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), supported the Taliban in Afghanistan.

Meanwhile, Karzai has blamed Islamabad for being the source of the conflict in his country, and called on his western allies to "destroy" the Taliban's sanctuaries inside Pakistan. (ANI)