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India-Pakistan
One terrorist killed, two injured in North Waziristan shootout
2023-06-13
[GEO.TV] One terrorist was killed and two others injured in an exchange of fire that took place between security forces and the miscreants in the general area of Spinwam,
...a charming name for a nasty little jihadi spot...
North Wazoo District, the public relations arm of the military said in a statement.

As per the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), one terrorist was killed and two others sustained injuries after the troops engaged with them at their location. Weapons and ammunition were also recovered from them.

"The killed terrorist remained actively involved in terr activities against the security forces as well as the killing of innocent citizens," the ISPR added. It further said that residents of the area appreciated the operation and expressed their full support to eliminate the menace of terrorism from the area.

The engagement with the turbans came a day after armed forces bumped off three turbans while four others were maimed in a gunbattle in the general Miranshah
... headquarters of al-Qaeda in Pakistain and likely location of Ayman al-Zawahiri. The Haqqani network has established a ministate in centered on the town with courts, tax offices and lots of madrassas...
 area in North Waziristan district, the ISPR had said.

The military's media wing had said that the soldiers fought gallantly but three of them were martyred in the intense exchange of fire that took place on the night between June 9 and 10.

"Own troops effectively engaged the terrorists’ location and resultantly three turbans were sent to hell, while four turbans were maimed. Weapons and ammunition were also recovered from the killed terrorists," a statement released by the ISPR read.

The martyred soldiers were identified as Subedar Asghar Ali, 40, Sepoy Naseem Khan, 26, and Sepoy Muhammad Zaman, 22.

The ISPR further stated that a sanitisation operation was being carried out to eliminate any other turbans found in the area.

"Armed forces of Pakistain are determined to eliminate the menace of terrorism and such sacrifices of our brave soldiers further strengthen our resolve," it reiterated.
Related:
Spinwam: 2023-06-03 Two terrorists killed in North Wazoo shootout
Spinwam: 2023-06-01 2 terrorists killed in gun battle with security forces in North Waziristan’s Dossali: ISPR
Spinwam: 2023-03-04 Terrorist gunned down in N Waziristan IBO
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India-Pakistan
Three soldiers martyred, terrorists gunned down in exchange of fire in N Waziristan
2023-06-12
[GEO.TV] The armed forces bumped off three forces of Evil while four others were maimed in a gunbattle in the general Miranshah
... headquarters of al-Qaeda in Pakistain and likely location of Ayman al-Zawahiri. The Haqqani network has established a ministate in centered on the town with courts, tax offices and lots of madrassas...
 area in North Wazoo district, the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said on Sunday.

The military's media wing stated that the soldiers fought gallantly but three of them were martyred in the intense exchange of fire that took place on the night between June 9 and 10 (Friday and Saturday).

"Own troops effectively engaged the terrorists’ location and resultantly three forces of Evil were sent to hell, while four forces of Evil were maimed. Weapons and ammunition were also recovered from the killed terrorists," a statement released by the ISPR read.

The martyred soldiers were identified as Subedar Asghar Ali, 40, Sepoy Naseem Khan, 26, and Sepoy Muhammad Zaman, 22.

The ISPR further stated that a sanitisation operation was being carried out to eliminate any other forces of Evil found in the area.

"Armed forces of Pakistain are determined to eliminate the menace of terrorism and such sacrifices of our brave soldiers further strengthen our resolve," it reiterated.

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India-Pakistan
3 soldiers martyred in gun battle with terrorists in North Waziristan: ISPR
2023-06-11
[Dawn] Three soldiers were martyred during a shootout with snuffies in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa’s North Wazoo district, the military’s media affairs wing said on Sunday.

In a statement, the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said that an exchange of fire took place between troops and snuffies in Miranshah
... headquarters of al-Qaeda in Pakistain and likely location of Ayman al-Zawahiri. The Haqqani network has established a ministate in centered on the town with courts, tax offices and lots of madrassas...
 on the night of June 9/10.

"Own troops effectively engaged the terrorists’ location and resultantly three snuffies were sent to hell while four snuffies were maimed. Weapons and ammunition were also recovered from the killed terrorists," the statement said.

It added that 40-year-old Subedar Asghar Ali, 26-year-old Sepoy Naseem Khan and 22-year-old Sepoy Muhammad Zaman were martyred during the "intense exchange of fire".

"Sanitisation of the area is being carried out to eliminate any other snuffies found in the area," the ISPR said.

"Armed forces of Pakistain are determined to eliminate the menace of terrorism and such sacrifices of our brave soldiers further strengthen our resolve," the statement said.

Earlier this week, a soldier was martyred during an exchange of fire between security forces and Death Eaters in the Ladha area of South Waziristan. Separately, two soldiers were martyred while two Death Eaters were killed during an exchange of fire in North Waziristan.
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India-Pakistan
10 convicted terrorists shifted to Sahiwal prison
2016-01-15
[DAWN] As many as 10 high profile, convicted gunnies were shifted to the new high security prison in Sahiwal from Adiala Jail on Wednesday.

Among the convincted prisoners transported to Sahiwal was Rana Naveed, who was sentenced to life imprisonment for his involvement in the Jhanda Chi Chi attack on former president Gen Pervez Perv Musharraf
... former dictator of Pakistain, who was less dictatorial and corrupt than any Pak civilian government to date ...
An official source in the prison department told Dawn that about 925 convicted prisoners being housed in various jails across Punjab
1.) Little Orphan Annie's bodyguard
2.) A province of Pakistain ruled by one of the Sharif brothers
3.) A province of India. It is majority (60 percent) Sikh and Hindoo (37 percent), which means it has relatively few Moslem riots....
were scheduled to be shifted to the newly constructed prison facility that can hold 1,044 inmates.

Among those transported to Sahiwal were Hameed Ullah - who was convicted in the POF Wah factory attack and awarded a death sentence, Saqib Ali Shah -- convicted in a 2012 terrorism case in the Wah Cantonment, Naseem Khan -- convicted in a kaboom in Jhand Attock, and Syed Zaman Khan -- convicted in an attack on military personnel in Swabi.

Omer Adeel, who was convicted in the 2007 R.A. Bazaar bombing, Hafiz Akram Saeed, Mohammad Aslam, Ameer Sohail and Intikhab Ahmed were also among the prisoners taken to Sahiwal.

"All the prisoners involved in terrorism and sectarian terrorism cases will be shifted to the high security prison," a senior prison department official said. The official said that over 50pc of these prisoners have already been transported.

According to official sources, 26 prisoners involved in terrorism cases and six prisoners involved in sectarian terrorism cases have been held at the Central Jail, Adiala.

Of the 26, seven have been awarded the death penalty, and their appeals are underway. Of the six involved in sectarian terrorism, three have been awarded the death penalty.

Mumtaz Qadri -- the former police commando convicted in the murder of former Punjab government Salman Taseer -- is currently being held at Adiala Jail, and will likely be shifted to Sahiwal during the second phase of the plan, the source said.
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India-Pakistan
School blown up in Bajaur
2014-05-10
[DAWN] KHAR: Unidentified bully boyz below up a government school in Kamangra area of Bajaur Agency, aka Turban Central
...Smallest of the agencies in FATA. The Agency administration is located in Khar. Bajaur is inhabited almost exclusively by Tarkani Pashtuns, which are divided into multiple bickering subtribes. Its 52 km border border with Afghanistan's Kunar Province makes it of strategic importance to Pakistain's strategic depth...
 on the night between Wednesday and Thursday.

The residents of the area said that a group of gunnies entered the building of the primary school for boys and planted several bombs in it.

The bombs went off and destroyed the school completely, however, there was no loss of human life as the building was vacant at the time of kabooms.

Confirming the incident, Assistant Political Agent Shah Naseem Khan said that the school building was destroyed completely. He said that a watchman was present in the school but he was overpowered by the bully boyz when they entered to the school.

The members of village defence committee reached the spot soon after the incident and opened firing on the bully boyz but they managed to escape.

No one grabbed credit for destroying the school.
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India-Pakistan
Karachi Korpse Kount
2012-07-06
KARACHI: Eight people, including an activist of the Mohajir Quami Movement-Haqiqi (MQM-H), fell prey to ongoing wave of target killing in the city on Thursday.

An activist of the MQM-H was shot dead at Landhi No 6 within the precincts of Landhi police station. A police official informed that Syed Farooq, 29, son of Syed Badshah, was sitting outside his house when unidentified motorcyclists shot him. The culprits managed to flee,while Farooq breathed his last while being shifted to the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC). An active worker of Landhi unit 80, Farooq, got married four months ago. Panic and fear gripped the locality following the incident.

Khalid Hameed, spokesman of the MQM-H, condemned the killing of party-man and demanded of the government to arrest those involved.

Separately, a cable operator was shot dead near Telephone Exchange, New Karachi within the limits of New Karachi police station. SHO Ashraf Gujjar said that the victim, Amir Khan, 28, son of Naseem Khan, was shot dead by unidentified pillion riders. The victim received three bullets whereas the culprits managed to flee from the scene. The body was shifted to the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital (ASH) for an autopsy.

A man was killed within the limits of Garden police station. According to police, Nasir, 22, son of Afzal, was on his way home in Usmanabad when an armed man shot him fatally in the temple. He died instantly while the body was shifted to the ASH for postmortem.

No respite on the spiritual night as five more people, including father and son, were killed and two others injured in four different incidents in Machhar Colony.

SHO Madad Ali Zardari informed that unidentified culprits opened targeted firing and left six people in critical condition. The injured were rushed to the Civil Hospital Karachi, where during treatment Haji Noor, 58, Siraj Mian, 30, Moin, 32, and Sohail, 31, succumbed to their injuries, while the condition of Ilyas, 27, and Khalid, 31, was stated as critical.

The SHO said that Haji Noor and Siraj were killed inside their home. He claimed that their killer was identified as Fareed Tunda member of Badshah Group who fled under the cover of darkness. He disclosed that police succeeded to apprehend three culprits and seized weapons from their possession.

The SHO said that initial investigation revealed that a group of Lyari gangsters was behind the incidents. Following the bloodshed, panic and fear creep up around the area as people compelled to stay homes.

Separately, a man was killed in North Karachi within the limits of Ajmair Nagri police station. Police said Muhammad Alam, 40, was shot dead by unidentified persons in North Karachi, sector 5-D-1. The body was moved to the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital for medico-legal formalities.
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India-Pakistan
Three peace activists kidnapped in Khyber
2012-06-29
[Dawn] Militants kidnapped three peace activists in Khyber Agency on the night between Tuesday and Wednesday, official sources said.

They said that members of banned jihad boy group Lashkar-e-Islam kidnapped three volunteers of Akkakhel Peace Committee at gunpoint from Sultankhel area. The kidnapped volunteers identified as Naseem Khan, Mohammad Imran and Faraz were on routine patrol in the area when they were intercepted and taken away at gunpoint. No clue to their whereabouts was found till late Wednesday.

Meanwhile,
...back at the comedy club, Boogie was cracking himself up, but nobody else seemed to be getting the non-stop jokes...
 security forces jugged
Drop the gat, Rocky, or you're a dead 'un!
 at least eight suspected faceless myrmidons during a raid on a house in Alamgudar area on Wednesday.

Officials said that Rustam Khan, a local commander of Lashkar-e-Islam, and three of his brothers were also among the jugged
Drop the gat, Rocky, or you're a dead 'un!
 persons. Identity of the rest of the jugged
Drop the gat, Rocky, or you're a dead 'un!
 men could not be established.

Also, tribal elders and activists of different political parties have strongly condemned suspension of privileges of Bar Qambarkhel tribe by the political administration.

Shah Jehan, a local leader of Jamaat-e-Islami
...The Islamic Society, founded in 1941 in Lahore by Maulana Sayyid Abul Ala Maududi, aka The Great Apostosizer. The Jamaat opposed the independence of Bangladesh but has operated an independent branch there since 1975. It maintains close ties with international Mohammedan groups such as the Moslem Brotherhood. the Taliban, and al-Qaeda. The Jamaat's objectives are the establishment of a pure Islamic state, governed by Sharia law. It is distinguished by its xenophobia, and its opposition to Westernization, capitalism, socialism, secularism, and liberalist social mores...
 in Bara, said that residents of the area had already suffered owing to the ongoing military operation. The suspension of privileges also affected the issuance of national identity card, domicile certificate, marriage certificate and other necessary documents to tribal people.

He said that it was unjust to punish the entire tribe for refusal of Bar Qambarkhel to raise an armed lashkar.
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India-Pakistan
Tribal elder among four killed
2011-11-07
[Dawn] A pro-government tribal elder and the wife of another elder were among four people killed in attacks by forces of Evil in South Wazoo and Bajaur agencies on Sunday.

Four people were maimed. Two forces of Evil are reported to have been killed.

Political sources said Malak Amanullah, one of the leaders of a tribal lashkar, and two other people were bumped off when suspected forces of Evil opened fire in Azam Warsak bazaar, about 20km west of Wana.

Malak Amanullah was struck down in his prime. Three people were maimed in the attack and taken to a hospital in Wana where two of them died.

It was not clear whether the other victims were passersby or associates of the Malak who had played an important role in forcing Uzbeks and their local Ahmedzai Wazir supporters to leave Waziristan.

No group grabbed credit for the attack.

One of the attackers was reportedly killed in firing by men accompanying the Malak.

According to our correspondent in Khar, the wife of pro-government tribal elder Malak Mohammad Omar was killed and he himself, his father and a son were maimed when about 25 forces of Evil stormed his house in Bara Kaman Gara area of Nawagai tehsil on Saturday night.The forces of Evil lobbed hand-grenades on the house and used heavy weapons.

The injured were taken to the agency headquarters hospital in Khar.

Political Tehsildar Shah Naseem Khan told news hounds that one of the attackers was killed and several others injured when security forces and tribal volunteers fired back.

Security personnel and volunteers sealed the area and started looking for the bully boyz and their supporters.

Local people said that Malak Omar had no enmity with anybody but he persisted with his support for the peace committee despite having received threats from the Taliban.
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Home Front: Culture Wars
Sacramento FBI chief rebuilds trust with Muslim leaders
2008-12-01
For months, Sacramento's top FBI agent kept a Muslim prayer rug in his office. It was for Imam Mohamed Abdul Azeez, religious leader of the SALAM Islamic Center in Sacramento, who attended a citizens' academy with Drew Parenti at the FBI office.

Parenti hasn't converted to Islam. He's been trying to convert Muslim leaders who might be suspicious of his agency after 9/11 and the Lodi terrorism case. And, after years of distrust, Azeez and other local Muslims believe they have found a friend in Parenti. The local FBI chief has visited several of the area's 14 mosques, ready to answer tough questions. He also has recruited an Egyptian Muslim agent who is known to the community and worships regularly at SALAM (Sacramento Area League of Associated Muslims) and other local mosques.

Local FBI agents and Muslim American leaders now come together "through friendship and partnership, not eavesdropping," Azeez said. "It's not us against them, and by working together, it's having a profound effect on preventing another 9/11. Prevention's not about phone- tapping and visiting people at 3 a.m., it's about being friends with the community.

"He's the guy with the gun," Azeez said. "If he puts a smile on his face and approaches you humbly, you're going to open up right away." Now, the imam and the FBI agent plan to travel around California and the nation, to show other communities how to build similar partnerships.

Azeez believes the Lodi investigation – which ended in 2006 with the conviction of one man of supporting terrorism – would play out much differently today. The new partnership between the FBI and area Muslims could prevent attempts to radicalize Muslim youths, Azeez said. "Someone familiar with law enforcement told me if we'd had an Arab or Muslim agent on the force, this whole Lodi thing would not have happened," Azeez said.

Farouk Fakira, a leader at south Sacramento's Masjid Annur – which invited Parenti to the mosque's open house Nov. 22 – agrees. Parenti "is very approachable, very decent," Fakira said. "If Drew was around, the Lodi thing wouldn't have happened because Drew would have known better."

Parenti, who inherited the Lodi case, "makes no apologies whatsoever for the case in terms of the way it was conducted or prosecuted." But he did say relationships now in place might prevent the "petri dish" of radical Islam from spawning hatred.

Parenti, 48, became Sacramento Special Agent In Charge on June 19, 2005 – 11 days after two Pakistani American Muslims from Lodi, Umer Hayat and his son Hamid, were arrested on suspicion of terrorism.

In 2006, Hamid Hayat was convicted of providing material support to terrorists by undergoing firearms training in Pakistan and returning to America prepared for jihad. Hayat, a 25-year-old cherry picker with a seventh-grade education, was convicted based on confessions he made during a 10-hour FBI interrogation without a lawyer present.

Hayat had been befriended by Naseem Khan, a Pakistani American Muslim from Oregon working undercover for the FBI. In phone conversations disclosed during trial, Khan goaded Hayat into attending a terrorist training camp and encouraged his interest in violent Islamic fundamentalism. Hayat – sentenced to 24 years – admitted relishing the murder of Jewish journalist Daniel Pearl. No evidence placed Hayat at a terrorist camp other than his conflicting statements to the FBI.

Parenti, a graduate of California State University, San Diego, with a degree in Spanish, is a 24-year FBI veteran. He once supervised the anti-drug trafficking program in Mexico City.

Two months after he arrived in Sacramento, Parenti recalled, he was intrigued by a newspaper headline, "New-Wave Imams," featuring Azeez, who had just become imam at SALAM. "I realized I did not know much about Islam," he said. He reached out to Azeez, an Egyptian American Muslim who wrote his University of Chicago master's thesis on the roots of suicide bombers
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Home Front: WoT
Terrorism informants at work across nation
2006-05-13
His work as an informant began after Oregon FBI agents first contacted him in connection with another criminal investigation.

The foreign-born man was not arrested and began cooperating with a federal investigation into potential terrorist-related activities by other Muslims. His work led to arrests and prosecutions.

That's the scenario played out not only in Lodi last year, but in 2002 in the FBI's investigation into the "Portland Seven," a group of Taliban sympathizers. And it's similar to terrorism investigations throughout the United States since the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.

Naseem Khan, the Pakistani-born informant who infiltrated Lodi's Muslim community, is again expected to be a key witness in the government's second trial of Umer Hayat, a 48-year-old mobile ice cream vendor accused of lying to the FBI about his alleged firsthand knowledge of Pakistani terrorist training camps.

Khan, 32, previously testified that his conversations about Hamid Hayat's "training" referred to his attendance at a terrorist camp. Umer Hayat's defense team argued the reference applied to religious education.

Hayat's first trial ended last month in a hung jury that was split on the two counts. Federal prosecutors announced May 5 they would retry the case, with jury selection scheduled to start June 5. Hayat's son, 23-year-old Hamid Hayat, was convicted April 25 by a different jury that decided he received terrorist training and lied about it.

Oliver "Buck" Revell, a former associate deputy director of the FBI, said informants are often necessary to stop potential terrorists or their friends from aiding America's enemies. Their use as a law enforcement tool grew in the 1950s, he said.

"The use of informants is nothing new," Revell said. "It's just that in the terrorism area, people aren't used to prosecutions absent a violent act, so now the prosecutions are based before the act, before they do anything violent."

Federal officials acknowledge that there were no impending attacks when terrorism-related arrests were made in Lodi; Toledo, Ohio; and Detroit.

Revell said arrests have other functions, though. "It's definitely intended to be a deterrent to specific acts and specific behaviors," Revell said. "If you choose to participate in a criminal enterprise, and if you lie or take some sort of material action that aids and abets, then you've violated the law."

But often, the suspects are arrested on "tenuous charges" based on an informant's reports and conversations, according to Carl Tobias, a University of Richmond, Virginia, law professor who studies terrorism cases.

He said Muslim informants often aren't given specific targets but instead are asked to look for possible suspects. In the Hayats' case, he said the fact Khan was paid roughly $230,000 in wages and expenses raises suspicions about informants' motives.

"You have to wonder when they get $250,000 and a car," Tobias said.

James J. Wedick, a retired FBI agent who worked with the Hayats' defense team, said other veteran FBI agents consider many of the terrorism cases weak. Wedick said informants are taking advantage of many Muslim immigrants' sympathy for other Muslim nations.

"Anybody who joins the bureau for a good case wouldn't work any of these cases for all the tea in China," Wedick said. "I would rather chase a white-collar crook or some violent guy, because there's plenty of them out there, rather than make up a case on these folks.

"They've gone into the Muslim community and found a level of hate there, and instead of trying to understand it,
because it's all about understanding and visualizing whirled peas ...
they've paid some hired gun who has a reason to find someone. And he will get that one person."

Muslims who attended the Hayats' trials said the FBI is actively recruiting other Muslims to look for other potential homegrown or immigrant terrorists.

The FBI's use of Khan in Lodi now has the city's Muslims suspicious of any newcomers. Revell said that's similar to the reaction many Italian-Americans had after the FBI infiltrated the mafia in the 1960s.

"It's an unfortunate aspect, but it's mandatory to penetrate organizations like al-Qaida or the Muslim Brotherhood," Revell said. "In order to do that, they have to send people in who can listen, overhear and report."
Link


Home Front: WoT
Hamid Hayat convicted
2006-04-26
A federal jury on Tuesday convicted a 23-year-old man of supporting terrorists by attending an al-Qaida training camp in Pakistan three years ago. Hamid Hayat, a seasonal farm worker in Lodi, an agricultural town south of Sacramento, was convicted of one count of providing material support to terrorists and three counts of lying to the FBI.

The verdict came hours after a separate jury hearing a case against the man's father deadlocked, forcing the judge to declare a mistrial. The father, 48-year-old ice cream truck driver Umer Hayat, is charged with two counts of lying to the FBI about his son's involvement in the training camp. Defense attorneys and prosecutors will meet in court May 5 to decide whether he will be retried.
One down, one to go.
Both men are U.S. citizens and stood trial in federal court before separate juries. They have been in custody since their arrests last June. Both cases initially generated widespread interest because they raised concerns about a potential terrorist cell centered in the wine- producing region about 35 miles south of the state capital. But the government presented no evidence of a terror network during the nine- week trial.

Instead, the case centered on videotaped confessions the men gave to FBI agents and a government informant who secretly recorded hundreds of hours of conversations but whose credibility was challenged by the defense. Prosecutors described Hamid Hayat as having "a jihadi heart and a jihadi mind" who returned from a two-year visit to Pakistan intent on carrying out attacks. Possible targets included hospitals, banks and grocery stores.

They presented no evidence to show that such attacks were imminent or even planned. But in closing arguments, a prosecutors said the case was intended to prevent terrorist attacks "long before anybody is hurt."
As opposed to afterwards, which tends to be something the otherwise dead victims will, or at least should, appreciate.
Defense lawyers for both men argued that the government didn't have a case against their clients because it had produced no evidence that the son ever attended a terrorist training camp. Their biggest hurdle was trying to persuade jurors to discount the men's videotaped confessions. The statements were given separately last June during lengthy interrogations by the FBI in Sacramento.
"Members of the jury, you have to disregard what my client said on those tapes! Why, he must have been under duress! Under the influence! Maybe he's just stoopid!"
"Hey!"
"Shaddup Hamid, I'm doing my best with what you gave me!"
Defense lawyers said the confessions were made under duress, after the men had been questioned for hours in the middle of the night.
"My client is an early to bed kind of man, and they kept him up past his bedtime! Obvious duress if I ever saw it!"
The father and son eventually told the agents merely what they thought they wanted to hear, without realizing the legal consequences, their lawyers argued.
"Where my clients came from, you can say anything to the cops and it doesn't matter!"
The trial is the result a government investigation into Lodi's 2,500-member Pakistani community that began after agents received a tip in 2001 that Lodi-area businesses were sending money to terrorist groups abroad. That investigation ultimately lead agents to Naseem Khan. The 32-year-old former Lodi resident was working a variety of fast-food and convenience store jobs in rural Oregon when agents approached him in October 2001, just a month after the terrorist attacks.

Khan, a Pakistani native who moved to the U.S. as a teenager, was recruited to infiltrate Lodi's Pakistani community. He initially investigated the money laundering allegations and then targeted a pair of local imams before finally befriending Hamid Hayat. The Hayats grew to eventually consider Khan almost a member of the family.

After Hamid Hayat left for Pakistan in spring 2003, Khan kept in touch and recorded their telephone calls _ some of which show Khan urging Hayat to attend a jihadi camp. In one conversation, Khan exhorted Hayat to "be a man _ do something!"

Hamid Hayat's lawyers seized on such conversations to show that the FBI informant pushed Hayat to attend a training camp, but ultimately produced no evidence that he had. They also questioned the informant's credibility, in part because of his own testimony. Khan said that just before he was recruited, he told FBI agents he had seen Osama bin Laden's physician and two other international terrorists living in Lodi during the late 1990s. At the time, they were wanted for attacks in the Middle East and Africa.

Defense attorneys and terrorism experts said it was highly unlikely they would have been in the U.S. at that time, a point prosecutors conceded later in the trial.
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India-Pakistan
Defense witness claims Lodi cell terror camp is a Pakistani military base
2006-04-05
A man on a humanitarian mission in Pakistan says what the U.S. government thinks is a terrorist training camp may actually be a Pakistani military facility.

"I was at the right location. I'm 100 percent sure of that," said James Lazor, a witness for the defense in the terrorism trial against Lodi's Hamid Hayat. Last month, Lazor was in Balakot, Pakistan searching for the camp and says he encountered Pakistani soldiers when he got close. When he spoke to one of them, Lazor said, "He was a military guy, no doubt in my mind."

Hamid Hayat, 23, is accused of training at a terrorism camp. Prosecutors claim his description of the area and the camp matches satellite images showing a complex of buildings tucked in the mountains of Pakistan's northwest Frontier Province.

Defense lawyers say Lazor's testimony disputes that. "Their expert sat on the stand and stated that in looking at the images that it cannot be a military camp, and he is clearly wrong," said Wazhma Mojaddidi, who represents Hamid Hayat. "The proof is in that the government is not able to, with all its resources, produce one person whoever went there. Us as the defense, we were able to find someone to go there, and he came back and reported what he saw."

Lazor testified that he went to Pakistan this past February, taking blankets to victims of the earthquakes as well as letters from California children to deliver to Pakistani children. He's a private citizen who went there on his own after speaking to friends about the needs of earthquake victims.

The defense would not reveal how they discovered Lazor was going there, but he agreed to try to find the terrorist camp armed with maps, a global positioning system device and the coordinates provided by defense attorneys.

Lazor said when he went up the trail and was about a mile and a half away, he was approached by a military-type vehicle. "I was stopped by a sergeant from the Pakistani military who said the area wasn't open to civilians and said it was a Pakistani military camp I would not be allowed access to," said Lazor. "He was polite and respectful. I mean if he was a terrorist it would've been a completely different scenario."

Lazor, who lead off Tuesday's defense witnesses, said he did very little research on the Hayat case before he went on his quest in Pakistan last month. "I went with an open mind," he said.

Also taking the stand was FBI agent Gary Schaaf, one of the agents who interrogated Hamid Hayat which was videotaped after Hayat claimed he attended training at the terrorist camp. Under defense questioning, he acknowledged that he often asked Hayat leading questions during the interview. Schaaf said he, not Hayat, was the one who first mentioned weapons and explosives training and the possibility someone would travel by bus to get there.

Besides the charge of training for terrorism, Hamid Hayat also faces three counts of lying to federal agents. The key evidence against him is his videotaped confession, along with secret tape recordings between him and a paid FBI informant, Naseem Khan.

On Wednesday, the trial for Hayat's father, Umer Hayat, resumes. The older Hayat, an ice cream truck driver from Lodi, is charged with lying to federal officials about his son's alleged involvement in terrorism.
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