Angry Clinton Defends Record on Fighting Al-qaida

Former US president Bill Clinton reacted angrily in a television interview yesterday to recent criticism of his failure to capture Osama bin Laden, accusing "President Bush's neocons" of failing to act until after the attacks of September 11 2001.

In the interview, due to be broadcast yesterday evening on the conservative Fox News Network, Mr Clinton became heated when asked why he had not "put Bin Laden and al-Qaida out of business".

"At least I tried," Mr Clinton said. "That's the difference [between] me and some, including all of the rightwingers who are attacking me now. They ridiculed me for trying. They had eight months to try. They did not try. I tried. So I tried and failed."

Mr Clinton's comments give a rare public insight into his feelings about the anti-terrorism policies of his successor and reflect heightened partisanship in the run-up to November's midterm elections.

They also reflect the former president's sensitivity following the recent broadcast of a docudrama which alleged that his administration had been distracted from pursuing Bin Laden by the furore surrounding the Monica Lewinsky affair.

Although Mr Clinton had agreed to appear on Rupert Murdoch's Fox News, which he normally shuns, to discuss his climate change initiative, the conversation swiftly turned to Bin Laden. The interviewer, Chris Wallace, appeared taken aback by the vehemence of Mr Clinton's response to the questioning, which he labelled a "nice little conservative hit job".

Mr Clinton said his administration did have a plan to kill Bin Laden, but that it was stymied by resistance from the CIA and the FBI, and a failure to secure the cooperation of Uzbekistan. "I got closer to killing him than anybody has gotten since," he said. "And if I were still president, we'd have more than 20,000 troops there trying to kill him. Now I never criticised President Bush, and I don't think this is useful. But you know we do have a government that thinks Afghanistan is one-seventh as important as Iraq."