Video 'reveals hijacker names'

Independent analysis of the chilling videotape showing Osama bin Laden gloating over the devastation of the 11 September attacks is said to show him naming three more hijackers, it emerged today.

ABC and CNN TV networks hired their own translators to examine every frame of the tape which was found in a house in Jalalabad and released in edited form by Pentagon officials last week.

According to the US government's transcript, Bin Laden only made specific mention of the hijackers' suspected ringleader, Mohammed Atta. However, CNN claimed its analysis of the video showed the Saudi-born militant referred to nine hijackers and both US networks agreed that he mentions, by name, the al Hazmi brothers.

"So these young men, may God accept their action, Nawaf al Hazmi, Salem al Hazmi," ABC's translation quoted Bin Laden as saying.

A Pentagon spokesman had no comment on the report but repeated an earlier statement explaining that their's was not a verbatim translation. The Pentagon went to great pains to ensure the tape, believed to have been shot in Khandahar in November, was authentic. Military chiefs brought in three translators.

Their verdict was that it incriminated Bin Laden in the World Trade Center attacks. CNN, however, also claims to have picked up on new commentsallegedly made by Bin Laden who is seen chatting to Saudi dissident Khalid al Harbi. He apparently says at one stage: "When you hear a breaking news announcement on the radio, kneel immediately, that means they have hit the World Trade Center."

A more extensive version of the government translation has yet to be released. ABC claims it has been told that its translation was consistent with portions of the government's analysis.

ABC hired a Lebanese translator who worked alongside an Egyptian. Both had difficulties with the Saudi dialect used. ABC's translation could also prove highly embarrassing for the Saudi Arabian governmenta key US partner. Al Harbi says he was smuggled into Afghanistan by a member of Saudi Arabia's religious police. In ABC's translation, Harbi tells Bin Laden that in Saudi Arabia several prominent clerics made speeches cheering the 11 September attacks.

Bin Laden at one point says that Sheikh Abdulah al Baraak, a professor at a government university in Saudi Arabia, "gave a very moving speech, right at the time of the attack on America, and he deserves thanks for that". The US deleted these remarks in the official translation released on 13 December, presumably to protect the US-Saudi relationship.