Detainee admits to planning attacks

WASHINGTON, March 19 (UPI) -- A detainee at Guantanamo Bay has allegedly admitted to helping plan the bombings of the U.S. embassy in Nairobi, Kenya, and the USS Cole in Yemen.

The Defense Department says Walid Muhammad Salih bin Attash made the admissions at a tribunal hearing last Monday at the detention facility.

Speaking through an interpreter, Attash said he met in Karachi, Pakistan, with the operator who carried out the 1998 embassy attack just hours beforehand.

"I was the link between Osama bin Laden and his deputy, Sheikh Abu Hafs al-Masi, and the cell chief in Nairobi," Attash said.

Attash is also alleged to have helped plan and carry out the 2000 attack on the USS Cole during a refueling stop in the Yemeni port of Aden, the Defense Department said in a release.

Attash, who said he was in Kandahar with bin Laden during the actual attack, allegedly purchased the boat and explosives, and recruited the people who conducted the attack.