Word: arabia
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Even if Saudi Arabia or others stepped into the financial breach, not all Afghans are convinced that the Taliban leadership can be easily peeled away from al-Qaeda. A senior Afghan security official points to a recent attack on the U.N. compound in Kabul that was planned and financed by al-Qaeda but executed by the Taliban. The war has brought their causes closer together, he says. "Now the real Taliban is no different from the real al-Qaeda. They are not a bunch of hungry guys fighting because al-Qaeda is paying them. They will never accept our vision...
...influence, and the U.S. and Europe are losing out to China and the Muslim world. There's a lot at stake: the Central Asian country has the world's fourth-largest reserves of natural gas and substantial oil reserves, putting it in the same energy league as Saudi Arabia, Russia and Iraq. Plus, its position just north of Afghanistan could be hugely beneficial to NATO as it seeks more reliable supply routes to its troops on the ground there. But the West isn't being welcomed with open arms. "They just don't understand us," one businessman tells TIME...
...rest of the world, the dispute presented a golden opportunity. The Middle East didn't waste time, stepping in with loans and development projects - or as one Western observer put it, "a rain of dollars." In June, the Islamic Development Bank - a lender in which Saudi Arabia, Libya and Iran hold the three largest stakes - agreed to build a railroad connecting Turkmenistan and Iran, the first direct rail link between the Islamic Republic and Central Asia. "As of today, our relations with the Islamic bank have really been activated," Tuvakmammed Japarov, the country's deputy prime minister for the economy...
...city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia has always been the spiritual center of the Islamic faith: the world's 1.3 billion Muslims genuflect in its direction during prayers. But in the final months of the year, Islam's holiest city becomes even more vital, as an estimated 2.5 million pilgrims make their once-in-a-lifetime journey to the site...
...Laden's foot soldiers. But our friendly freedom fighters turned into foes. In 1992 al-Qaeda bombed a hotel in Yemen, hoping to kill American Marines bound for Somalia. Then came the first World Trade Center bombing, in 1993. Three years later, the Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia killed 19 U.S. Air Force personnel. In 1996 and 1998, bin Laden issued fatwas calling for Muslims to rise up and kill Americans. Making good on bin Laden's word, al-Qaeda blew up U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in synchronized attacks on Aug. 7, 1998, killing almost 300, including...