Police in Madrid arrest five more

MADRID - Police arrested five more people in the Madrid train bombings as the death toll rose Thursday to 202, making the blasts - along with the 2002 Bali nightclub blasts - the worst terrorist strike since the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States.

The arrests brought to 11 the total suspects in Spanish custody and came as the country marked a week since the bombings that shocked Europe, led to a stunning election defeat for the government and roiled Madrid's relations with the United States.

In Morocco, police also rounded up associates of Jamal Zougam, a key suspect in the train bombings with alleged al-Qaida ties.

The death of a 22-year-old Peruvian woman increased the toll in the attacks to 202 - the same number killed by bombings in Bali, Indonesia, in October 2002. Nearly 3,000 people died in the Sept. 11 attacks carried out by Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network.

The latest arrests added to suspicions Moroccan extremists linked to Islamic terrorism were behind the Madrid bombings. At least three of the five suspects arrested Wednesday and Thursday are Moroccan nationals, according to a Moroccan official.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - Secretary of State Colin Powell announced Thursday that the United States will give Pakistan easier access to military weapons and equipment, despite questions about the Pakistani military's role in selling nuclear secrets to other nations.

Powell told a news conference here that the United States plans to designate Pakistan as a major non-NATO ally, a status that would allow the South Asia nation to buy controversial depleted uranium ammunition and receive U.S. government financing to obtain weapons.

The designation is mostly a symbolic recognition of this nation's importance to the U.S.-declared war on terrorism.

Pakistan joins longtime allies such as Japan and Australia in receiving the status, which the Bush administration has awarded in recent years to a growing number of nations, including Kuwait, Thailand, the Philippines and Bahrain.

SOLDIERS DIE IN AFGHANISTAN: Two American soldiers were killed and two others were wounded in fighting Thursday in central Afghanistan, the U.S. military said.

U.S. Central Command said the American soldiers were accompanied by troops of the Afghan National Army when they were attacked by "anticoalition militia" in a village near Tarin Kowt.

The Americans were not identified. The attack did not appear to be related to the hunt for Ayman al-Zawahri.

"REMEMBER 9/11,' GENERAL SAYS: Retired Gen. Tommy Franks said Thursday that when weighing the toll of the Iraq war, Americans should remember how they felt after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

He said they should consider that the war on terror "is not about us. This is about the future."

"We have to decide how much price is too great a price, and my personal view is that no price that this current generation might have to pay is too great a price to give my grandkids, etc., the opportunities, options that I had when I was a kid growing up," said Franks, speaking in Boca Raton.

WANTED MORE THAN EVER: The House of Representatives voted unanimously Thursday to double the reward for Osama bin Laden's capture to $50-million. The bill, which was passed 414-0, now goes to the Senate.

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