Video 'shows al-Qaeda terrorist training'

Many trained terrorists may still be at large

A video has been broadcast which is believed to show al-Qaeda terrorists undergoing intensive training at a camp in Afghanistan to attack Western targets.

Western intelligence agencies will pay close attention to the seven-hour video - discovered by an American adviser working with anti-Taleban Afghan fighters of the Northern Alliance.

Training exercises were conducted in a secret camp

It shows militants, most of whom appear to be Arabs, practising hostage-taking and assassination in realistic exercises with live ammunition - conducted in the privacy of an entire village which was taken over by Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network.

One sequence shows a small boy - aged about two - holding a gun. A man's voice asks him in Arabic why he is carrying a gun. Is it to kill infidels, the voice inquires.

The video shows fighters storming a building and taking hostages, barking commands at them in English and shooting one captive dead.

Another part shows militants poring over a map of a western-style traffic intersection.

Fighters are then shown in an apparent assassination attack on a motorcade.

The Guantanamo Bay base has been prepared for the detainees

In Afghanistan, the US is continuing its operation to transfer al-Qaeda prisoners to a Cuban detention facility.

Another 30 Taleban and al-Qaeda prisoners left by plane for Guantanamo Bay on Sunday.

The prisoners, who were shackled and had white caps covering their faces, boarded a transport plane at the US base in Kandahar.

The first group of 20 detainees arrived on Friday, and the US has defended their treatment amid international criticism.

The training video footage includes what appears to be a plan to assassinate world leaders at a golf tournament.

The militants are seen carrying their weapons onto the course in golf bags and using a rocket-propelled grenade to kill their targets.

Villagers driven out

The village north of Kabul where the terrorist training exercises appear to have been filmed was cleared of residents three years ago to make way for an al-Qaeda camp, local people say.

One man who tried to return to the village says he was stopped by Arabs who threatened to kill him because, he says, they were determined to keep the camp secret.

The BBC's Jonathan Charles says dozens of fighters were schooled in the camp.

Many may still be at large, he says. Most of the people in the camp are believed to have escaped when it was captured by the Northern Alliance with US air support.