The al-Qaida head Osama bin Laden announced that more attacks on the United States were under preparation, but offered the American people a conditional truce, according to a new tape purportedly from him aired by the al- Jazeera channel on Thursday.

"There are more operations now under preparation and you will see them, God willing," said the speaker on the tape, who identified himself as bin Laden.

But the speaker also said that the al-Qaida group did not oppose to having a long-term ceasefire with the U.S., which he said should based on "fair conditions."

The speaker also called the U.S.-led war on Iraq was a colonial war and that the situation in Afghanistan would "have a favorable change toward the al-Qaida."

It is the latest tape purportedly from bin Laden since Dec. 27, 2004 when a tape emerged in which he appointed the Jordanian-born Abu Musab al-Zarqawi as the group's leader in Iraq.

The authenticity of the tape can not be immediately verified.

The al-Qaida has been behind the deadly Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the U.S.

Source: Xinhua