MOSCOW -- The Russian intelligence service had warned Washington several times in the past of the possibility of terrorist strikes on U.S. soil, the head of the service, Nikolai Patrushev, said yesterday.

"We had clearly warned them," said Mr. Patrushev, who is head of the FSB, the successor organization to the KGB.

He added that their U.S. counterparts "did not pay the necessary attention" to their warnings, the Interfax news agency reported.

Washington has named Saudi-born dissident Osama bin Laden, currently living in Afghanistan as a "guest" of the Islamic fundamentalist Taliban regime, as the No. 1 suspect thought to be behind Tuesday's carnage in New York and Washington.

Mr. Patrushev said the FSB knew exactly where bin Laden was until Tuesday, but he had since left his base.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, a former KGB agent who is currently in Armenia, said yesterday of the terror attacks: "Evil must be punished."

© AFP 2001

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