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The US independent commission investigating the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks will show the tragedy could have been prevented in its final report, news reports said Wednesday.
"Scores" of opportunities to nab the hijackers and foil the plot were missed, Lee Hamilton, vice chairman of the panel, was quoted by a USA Today report as saying.
The panel is determined not to see its work used by either party for political gain during the presidential election campaign, leaders of the commission said.
The commission aims to finish the report before July 26, because panel members do not want it released at the start of the Democratic National Convention, which opens that day.
The commission is still working with intelligence agencies to collect as much information as possible from Sept. 11 plotters. The commission is close to an agreement with the Bush administration that would allow the panel to submit questions to captured al-Qaeda leaders believed to have been involved in planning the attacks, a New York Times report said.
The commission is also waiting for the White House to act on its request to declassify a 1998 CIA memo to then-president Bill Clinton on the terrorist threat posed by al-Qaeda.
The commission, formally known as the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States, will hold its 11th public hearing on emergency response in New York next Tuesday and Wednesday.
The commission was set up in late 2002 to examine security-related issues before the attacks and response afterwards and to make recommendations on guarding against future attacks.
(Xinhua News Agency May 13, 2004)
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