A Slap in the Face

President Bush's top counterterrorism adviser flew to Yemen last week to praise that country's cooperation in the war on terrorism just days before Yemeni authorities reportedly pardoned and released one of the principal architects of the October 2000 bombing of the USS Cole.

The apparent release of confessed Al Qaeda operative Jamal al-Badawi, who has been indicted in New York on 50 terrorism counts, was a personal embarrassment  to senior White House aide Frances Fragos Townsend.

Since last week, Yemeni authorities have insisted that Badawi is back in "custody," but U.S. officials remain deeply skeptical about the current status of a fanatic follower of Osama bin Laden whom they hold directly responsible for the deaths of 17 U.S. sailors aboard the Cole.

Just last Wednesday, Badawi—who in 2004 was convicted by a Yemeni court and received the death penalty—was reportedly receiving well-wishers at his home in Aden after pledging his loyalty to Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh. Yet two days earlier, on Oct. 24, Townsend had met with Saleh in the country's capital of Sana to personally hand-deliver a letter from President Bush affirming U.S. support for his government's assistance in the War on Terror. BUSH PRAISES YEMEN'S ROLE IN COMBATING TERRORISM read the headline in the English-language Yemen Times last week announcing Towsend's meeting with Saleh.

Townsend, who serves as Bush's chief assistant for homeland security and counterterrorism, was furious to learn of Badawi's release and has taken the lead role in communicating the U.S. government displeasure with the handling of the Al Qaeda figure, according to a senior administration official who asked not to be identified because of diplomatic sensitivities.

Compounding the insult, U.S. officials say they have strong reason to believe a number of other Al Qaeda figures have been released by the Yemenis, including Jaber Elbaneh, an FBI fugitive who was indicted for providing material support to Al Qaeda as part of the investigation into a terror cell in Lackawana, N.Y., in 2003.

In a brief interview with NEWSWEEK on Wednesday, Townsend—who had worked on the Cole investigation when she served in the Justice Department during the Clinton administration—made clear her frustration over the chain of events. "There is nobody in Yemen we care more about than Badawi," she said. Scott Stanzel, a  White House spokesman, said in a statement to NEWSWEEK: "We are dismayed and deeply disappointed in the Government of Yemen's decision not to imprison" Badawi. He added that Townsend, who was also in Saudi Arabia last week, was on the ground in Yemen "for just a few hours."