Egypt Warned U.S. of a Qaeda Plot, Mubarak Asserts
Egyptian intelligence warned American officials about a week before Sept. 11 that Osama bin Laden's network was in the advance stages of executing a significant operation against an American target, President Hosni Mubarak said in an interview on Sunday.

Using a secret agent they had recruited who was in close contact with the bin Laden organization, Mr. Mubarak said, his intelligence chiefs tried unsuccessfully to halt the operation.

Mr. Mubarak said his intelligence officials had no indication what the target would be and had no idea of the magnitude of the coming attack.

"We didn't know that such a thing could take place," he said, referring to the Sept. 11 attacks. "We thought it was an embassy, an airplane, something, the usual thing."

But, he added, to discover after the event that the terrorists were going to take airplanes and destroy buildings, "that is unbelievable."

Still, Mr. Mubarak's disclosure represents the first time a foreign leader has said that an intelligence service had penetrated Mr. bin Laden's network, Al Qaeda, to the extent that discussions about specific operations — and whether they could be halted or postponed — were under way.

Mr. Mubarak did not say whether he knew how American counterterrorism officials had reacted to the Egyptian warning, which a senior United States intelligence official denied was received. But Mr. Mubarak said he believed that security at the United States Embassy in Cairo was tightened in early September as a result of the warning.

"We informed them about everything," he said, referring to American intelligence officials.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/04/national/04WARN.html