No Evidence of Pakistani or U.S. SIGINT Intercepts of "Al-Qaeda" in Pakistan Tribal Regions

By Wayne Madsen

(Rense.com) - Intelligence sources are scoffing at the Pakistani Interior Ministry contention that it could prove that former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto was assassinated on the orders of [tribal] chief in South Waziristan, Baitullah Mehsud. The Interior Ministry[Spokesman, Army Brigadier (R) Javed Iqbal Cheema, claims that it recorded an "intercept" of Mehsud's [undated telephone] communication in which Mehsud allegedly congratulated his [unknown, unidentified] follower for the attack on Bhutto in the heavily-garrisoned city of.

Bhutto's political party [Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP)] and Mehsud both rejected the claims about the communication intercept of Mehsud.

U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) sources have told WMR [WayneMadsen Report] that Signals Intelligence (SIGINT) intercepts of "Al-Qaeda" and "Taliban" leaders are rare in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and elsewhere.

Not only is cell phone coverage spotty to non-existent in remote areas like Waziristan, but ever since the 1996 [U.S.] NSA intercept of Chechen President Dzokhar Dudayev's satellite telephone call to Moscow, which was passed in to Russian security authorities who triangulated his position and killed him with an air-to-surface missile, "Al-Qaeda" and "Taliban" leaders, including Osama Bin Laden, have refrained from using electronic communications, mindful of U.S.intelligence's capability to lock in on the locations of cell phone and satellite phone signals.