The Sunday Times reports that Essam Deraz claims he took the footage over four years at Al-Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan from 1986-1989 when the Mujaheddin was still fighting against the Russians. He said that five of his clips appear in the film and they are the only ones ever taken that show Bin Laden on the battlefield.
"I was the only cameraman with the Arabs. All of those shots of Bin Laden talking in the cave, talking into his walkie-talkie, they were all my work.
"I was there from 1986-1989 and was in contact with Bin Laden on many occasions. I saw him in Peshawar in Pakistan and in Jalalabad in Afghanistan. The film clips in 'Fahrenheit 9/11' -- five of them -- were mostly shot in March and April 1989," Deraz said.
Deraz, who says he has no sympathies with Al Qaeda, has filed with the Egyptian public attorney seeking his intellectual property rights and asking for the film to be confiscated until he is paid for the footage.
Moore's lawyer Andrew Hurwitz said that the film production company had obtained a licence from Arab news station Al Jazeera, which owned the rights to the clips, to use them.
However, Deraz disputes this and claims that he never sold the clips to anyone.
'Fahrenheit 9/11', in which Moore attacks President Bush over his policy in Afghanistan and Iraq, was released in America in June 2004 and has since made more than £130m at the box office worldwide after being made on a budget of just over £3m. It went on to make more than £50m outside the US and is set to enjoy further DVD sales.
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