Washington - A speaker identified as Osama bin Laden urges the world to convert to Islam but apparently makes no specific anti- US threats in what appeared to be the al-Qaeda leader's first video message in nearly three years, US media reported Friday. In a taunt to US President George W Bush, the purported message emerged days before the anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks on New York and Washington, which killed almost 3,000 people.
Cable News Network (CNN), which obtained a transcript of the tape, said references to recent US politics, new French President Nicolas Sarkozy and last month's anniversary of the US nuclear bombing of Hiroshima indicated that the message may be from this summer.
US intelligence officials were analyzing the video for authenticity and content. If the man on the tape is bin Laden, he seemed to have cropped his once-grey beard and dyed it black.
The speaker blames big corporations for global warming and muses about why the US Democratic Party has failed to stop the war in Iraq.
"To conclude, I invite you to embrace Islam, for the greatest mistake one can make in the world and one that is uncorrectable is to die while not surrendering to Allah, the Most High, in all aspects of one's life - i.e., do die outside of Islam," CNN quoted the transcript as saying.
A Washington firm that monitors al-Qaeda messages on the internet, SITE Intelligence Group, said the video was meant to mark six years since the September 11 attacks.
"We are analyzing the tape (and) closely evaluating its content, especially for any reference to specific threats," a US government official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.
CNN said the video contained no apparent threats.
It would be bin Laden's first video message since October 29, 2004, when he claimed responsibility for the attacks on New York and Washington and warned of further strikes. He aired four audio messages between January and July 2006.
SITE had announced the video's emergence Thursday after finding it on jihadist websites.
Earlier, President George W Bush's homeland security adviser Frances Townsend dismissed the message as propaganda.
"I just think people have got to be clear that we are being manipulated every time that they issue a statement, because they are trying to use the media as a way to terrorize us," Townsend told CNN.
"After all, we haven't seen an attack, and this is one way that they try to terrorize the American people," she said.
The US Homeland Security Department had said Thursday when news of the video emerged there was "no credible information" about any planned terrorist strike against the US.
In the past, al-Sahab messages on the anniversary of the attacks have included a video each year in which they show the final words of one of the attackers.
The United States stepped up its hunt for bin Laden after al-Qaeda carried out the September 11 attacks. US intelligence suspects he is hiding in mountainous terrain along the Afghan-Pakistani border.
US forces reportedly narrowly missed him during the battle of Tora Bora in December 2001 between US and Afghan forces, and al-Qaeda and the Taliban. Not having sufficient US soldiers in the region is cited as a reason bin Laden was able to slip away.
