Al Qaeda: Bin Laden To Air Message

Al Qaeda's media wing announced Monday that it would soon release a new message from the terror network's leader Osama bin Laden.

As-Sahab said bin Laden would address European countries in the message. It did not elaborate.

The advertisement, which was posted Monday on an Islamic militant Web site, featured a photograph of the bearded bin Laden dressed in a traditional white Arab robe.

"Soon, if God allows, the lion sheik Osama bin Laden, may God protect him, (will give) a message to the European nations," the posting said.

As-Sahab did not say when the message would be released and whether it would be a video or audio tape. But the U.S.-based IntelCenter, which monitors terror Web sites, said the message would be a video and would be released within 72 hours.

The militant Web site that advertised as-Sahab's announcement urged Islamic militants to advertise the forthcoming message to unnamed Western sites in order to "give them the unseen truth of their failed war."

The authenticity of Monday's as-Sahab announcement could not be independently confirmed.

Bin Laden has issued four other public statements this year -- on Sept. 7, Sept. 11, Sept. 20 and Oct. 22. The Sept. 7 video was bin Laden's first in three years and was issued to mark the sixth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States.

The last one in October was an audiotape broadcast on Al-Jazeera television where bin Laden called for Iraqi insurgents to unite and avoid divisive "extremism."