McVeigh admits Reno was a target

Timothy McVeigh has admitted he considered assassinating the then US Attorney General, Ms Janet Reno, before deciding to bomb the Oklahoma City federal building for which he faces execution next month.

The admission came in a letter to Fox News which the television network has released. In the letter, he explains he wanted to make clear his rationale for the bombing, a protest against the government's 1993 lethal attack on the Branch Davidian cult in Waco, Texas. McVeigh contends that the Oklahoma attack was the moral equivalent "to the US hitting a government building in Serbia, Iraq or other nations".

"Based on the observations of the policies of my own government, I viewed this action as an acceptable option," he wrote.

The bombing, he says, was both retaliatory and a preemptive strike against a federal government that was "increasingly militaristic and violent".

Among other targets he contemplated was Ms Reno - "making her accept full responsibility in deed not just word" for the deaths at Waco - Judge Walter Smith, who presided over the trial of several Branch Davidians, and Mr Lon Horuchi, an FBI officer involved in a deadly raid on a white separatist in Idaho.

Asked about his description of civilian and child casualties as "collateral damage", McVeigh writes: "Collateral damage? As an American news junkie, a military man, and a Gulf War veteran, where do they think I learned that? It sure wasn't Osami Bin Laden (sic)", a misspelt reference to the Saudi terrorist.

The media is prohibited from interviewing McVeigh on camera or audiotape.