FBI adds bin Laden, Kopp to Most Wanted list

Bin Laden, top, Kopp, bottom



ALSO: FBI's Ten Most Wanted

June 7, 1999

Web posted at: 3:09 p.m. EDT (1909 GMT)

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Two elusive murder suspects -- suspected terrorist Osama bin Laden and James Kopp, recently charged with the murder of an abortion provider -- were added Monday to the FBI's "Ten Most Wanted" list.

Attorney General Janet Reno and FBI Director Louis Freeh made the announcement at a Washington news conference.

Bin Laden, son of a Saudi billionaire, is accused of being the mastermind behind the almost simultaneous bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania last August that left more than 200 dead.

The U.S. government has already offered a $5 million reward for information leading to his capture.

After the embassy bombings the United States launched cruise missile attacks against camps used by bin Laden's group in eastern Afghanistan. The United States also bombed a chemical factory in Sudan, saying it supplied bin Laden with ingredients for nerve gas.

An arrest warrant was issued in May for Kopp, whose last known address was St. Albans, Vermont.

He is charged in the October 23, 1998, slaying of Dr. Barnett Slepian, an obstetrician-gynecologist killed by a sniper's bullet as he stood in the kitchen of his home in Amherst, New York, a Buffalo suburb.

Authorities are uncertain of the whereabouts of Kopp, a regular fixture at anti-abortion protests, although some agents theorize he might have fled to Mexico or Canada.

The new additions replace two Libyans, now in custody, who are accused of the 1988 bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, which killed 270 people.

A Scottish court sitting in the Netherlands Monday granted a request by defense lawyers to delay the trial of Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi and Lamen Khalifa Fhimah until February 2000.

Correspondent Pierre Thomas contributed to this report.