Clinton Honors Embassy Bombing Victims

[Gerald]

DAR ES SALAAM, Tanzania — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Sunday honored those killed in the bombings of the American embassies here and in Kenya in 1998, a day after the authorities confirmed the death of the feared Al Qaeda operative who masterminded the attacks.

“We have not forgotten your losses,” Mrs. Clinton told diplomats and employees at the embassy here, built after the attacks, which killed more than 200 people, including 12 Americans. She spoke after laying flowers in front of a stone memorial for the dead, accompanied by three Tanzanians who survived the bombing of the embassy here.

“And we have also not forgotten our pledge to seek justice against those who would commit such atrocities,” Mrs. Clinton said.

The mastermind of the bombings, Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, Al Qaeda’s leader in East Africa, was killed in a late-night shootout on Tuesday at a military checkpoint in Mogadishu, Somalia’s capital. Somalia and American officials confirmed his identity on Saturday, as Mrs. Clinton arrived in Tanzania on a visit intended to highlight American aid programs and the progress she said the country had made.

Mr. Mohammed, also known by the American authorities as Haroun Fazul, was indicted for his role in masterminding the bombings and remained one on the F.B.I’s most wanted list, with a $5 million bounty for information leading to his capture. Rather than being the target of a military operation, he appeared to have blundered into a checkpoint in a part of Mogadishu controlled by the government and was killed in a firefight.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/13/wo...a.html?_r=1&hp


Note: Published: June 12, 2011