The Crown Prince of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) asked the US to bomb the headquarters of Al Jazeera during the war in Afghanistan, according to a diplomatic cable released by WikiLeaks.

The document details a conversation between US diplomat Richard Haass and Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed — referred to as ‘MBZ’ - in the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq in 2003. The royal urged Haass to control media coverage of the war and ‘emphasized the importance of reining in the Doha-based Al-Jazeera network prior to any military action’, reports www.rt.com.

The cable also details how the crown prince ‘laughingly recalled’ a meeting between Qatari Emir Hamad Al-Thani and Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan, bin Zayed’s father, before the US invasion of Afghanistan.

‘Hamad complained about a report he had received that MBZ had asked General Franks to bomb Al-Jazeera. According to MBZ, Zayed derisively responded: ‘Do you blame him?’’ the leaked cable reads.

In his comments, made in the run-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, MBZ warned that public opinion in the Arab world over the invasion - which he described as ‘containable’ if the war was short and efficient - could be heavily inflamed by the Qatar TV network’s coverage and advised that its influence be reined in.

MBZ said ‘it was a mystery to him why the Qataris continued to inflame public opinion’ through Al Jazeera... ‘and suggested that the US use its weight to pressure Doha’.

The cable added that MBZ had ‘emphasised the need for US engagement with the Qataris to rein in Al Jazeera’.

In April 2003, the Al-Jazeera office in Baghdad was struck by a US missile killing one staff member and wounding another, though a US Central Command spokesman told BBC News the station ‘was not and never had been a target.’ 

In 2001 the station’s Kabul office was hit by two bombs in another US attack, although there were no casualties, reports middleeasteye.net.

At the time, chief editor Ibrahim Hilal said he believed the attack had been long-planned. US officials had criticized the outlets coverage of the war in Afghanistan, describing the reporting of the bombing campaign in particular as inflammatory propaganda, reports www.rt.com.

‘I still believe the decision to exclude our office from the coverage was taken weeks before the bombing,’ Hilal said. ‘But I don’t think they would do that while we were the only office in Kabul.’

In April 2003, a US missile struck Al Jazeera’s offices in Baghdad, killing one member of staff and injuring another. A spokesman for US Central Command said at the time that Al Jazeera ‘was not and never had been a target.’

Al Jazeera has more than 65 bureaus across the globe – including Doha, London and Washington DC – and broadcasts to more than 220 million households in over 100 countries.

The statement appears to show decades-long enmity between Qatar and the UAE over Al Jazeera, which has boiled to the surface once again with a Saudi, UAE, Bahrain and Egypt-led blockade of Qatar and demands to close the network down.

Last week Riyadh laid down a list of 13 demands for Qatar, which also included ending Doha’s support for the Muslim Brotherhood, a downgrade of diplomatic ties with Iran and the shutting of a Turkish military base outside Doha.