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Europe

Spain stops suicide bomber

2007-10-12

A Frenchman of Moroccan origin caught with a crude bomb was a potential suicide attacker — not a despondent, jilted lover as he originally told police — and a Spanish judge has ordered him held on suspicion of terrorism, newspapers said Friday. The 30-year-old was stopped at a routine highway checkpoint Sunday in the northeast Catalonia region shortly after he drove across the border from France. Police found his car to be carrying two butane gas canisters fitted with large firecrackers, and a samurai sword. The man told police he wanted to committed suicide because his partner had left him, Catalan police said Monday on their web site. Police said then that they did not know why he drove all the way from his home in the Alsace region of France to kill himself in Spain. But investigators eventually found the man to be in possession of two Arabic-language letters — one praising jihad, or holy war, and another in which he said goodbye to his family, and while in custody they observed he had shaved his body completely. They said this is a common act among suicide bombers who see it as a way to die in a state of cleanliness and purity, El Mundo said. Investigators concluded the man may have been planning a suicide attack targeting a building in Barcelona, El Mundo and El Pais said. Judge Juan del Olmo of the National Court questioned the suspect Thursday and ordered him held in jail on suspicion of planning a terrorist attack, the papers said. The judge also ordered a psychiatric evaluation of the man, they said.

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Europe

Madrid bombing suspect loses last appeal in UK

2007-03-01

Spaniard Moutaz Almallah Dabas, who was arrested in Britain for his alleged links to the Madrid bombing, on Wednesday lost his last bid to avoid extradition to Spain for trial. Five judges of the House of Lords rejected an appeal lodged by the Syrian-born Dabas, brother of Mouhannad Almallah Dabas, one of the 29 people currently on trial in Spain for their alleged roles in the March, 2004 attacks. The nearly simultaneous backpack-bomb explosions on four rush-hour commuter trains killed 191 people and wounded nearly 2,000 others in the worst terrorist attack in Spanish history. Prosecutors contend that those who carried out the massacre did so as an act of "holy war" terrorism motivated by radical Islamic fundamentalism. The Chamber of Lords, which constitutes the highest court in Britain, rejected arguments by attorneys for Dabas that he might be subjected to cruel conditions or even torture in Spain if extradited. Dabas was arrested in March, 2005 in Slough, west London, on a warrant issued by Spanish Judge Juan del Olmo. The alleged terrorist collaborator previously had lost a bid in London's High Court to block extradition after a British magistrate had ruled that he should be sent to Madrid for trial. Spanish prosecutors say the Dabas brothers conspired with several of those implicated in the massacre.

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Europe

New 'ringleader' charged with Madrid train bombings

2007-03-01

The judge investigating the Madrid train bombings on Wednesday accused a new suspect of being a ringleader of the attacks. Judge Juan del Olmo accused Moroccan Abdelilah Hriz, 29, of being a ‘material author’ of the bombings. Hriz, who is currently in prison in Morocco, was allegedly linked to the attacks by DNA found on a comb and blood-stained trousers found at the flat and a house where a number of the leading suspects were staying. Del Olmo went to Morocco to get a sample of DNA from Hriz last year. Hriz has now been charged in connection with causing the deaths of 191 people, the attempted murder of 1,811 people who were hurt in the bombings and helping to mount four terrorist attacks.

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Europe

Spanish Police Arrest 5 in Train Bombing

2007-01-03

MADRID, Spain (AP) -- Police have arrested five men who could have aided the escape of two fugitives of the 2004 Madrid train bombings, Spain's interior minister said Wednesday. Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba said each of the five, who are also suspected of ties with international terrorism, was detained in a different Spanish city - Barcelona, Tarragona, Gerona, Cadiz and A Coruna. The five, identified as Zohaib Khadiri, Djilali Boussiri, Nasreddine Ben Laid Amri, Samir Tahtah and Kamal Ahbar, may have collaborated in the escape of two fugitives of the Madrid bombings, Moroccans Mohamed Belhadj and Mohamed Afalah, Rubalcaba said. "This operation has led to arrest of five men suspected of links with the March 11 bombings" Rubalcaba said. He added that the operation had been ordered by National Court Judge Juan del Olmo, who is probing the blasts aboard four commuter trains that killed 191 people and injured more than 1,500. The bombings were blamed on a group of mostly North African Muslim extremists. Belhadj, along with Said Berraj and Daoud Ouhane, is sought by authorities, although all are believed to have fled Spain long ago. Afalah is believed to have blown himself up in Iraq. One never tires of hearing reports such as that. The nationalities of the detained and other details of the arrests were not immediately available. At least one of the detained, Tahtah, was already in prison for another terrorism case. Tahtah was ordered jailed last year on charges of belonging to a Syrian-based network that recruited suicide bombers to attack U.S. troops in Iraq. Police said they found forged documentation and cash in the raids.

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Europe

‘Madrid attackers were trained in Afghanistan’

2006-09-28

MADRID: Techniques used to detonate the bombs which killed 191 people and injured 1,900 in Madrid in March 2004 were learnt in a training camp in Afghanistan, the daily El Pais said on Wednesday, quoting a confidential police report. These techniques, using the vibrators of mobile telephones to simultaneously detonate several bombs, were taught in a camp near Jalalabad run by the Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group (GICM), said the report. The Spanish judiciary says the militant Islamic group is principally responsible for the March 11, 2004 attack for which 29 people have been charged. The report says that investigations “have revealed the existence of other individuals involved in the attacks” apart from those who have been arrested and charged, El Pais said. It adds that these carefully planned attacks could have been the work of “one of more terrorists with know-how and experience gained in Afghanistan or other combat zones.” The attacks on the trains which were approaching Madrid’s Atocha train station from Alcala de Henares were the worst in Europe since the explosion of a PanAm airliner over Lockerbie in Scotland in 1988 which killed 270 people. Spanish courts on Monday confirmed charges against 29 people accused of taking part in or being an accomplice to the attacks, most of them radical Moroccan Islamists resident in Spain. Their trial is expected to open in late January or early February 2007. Examining magistrate Juan del Olmo in charge of the case, believes the attacks were undertaken by a local Islamist cell “inspired by Al-Qaeda” but which acted under its own initiative to force Spanish troops to leave Iraq before claiming responsibility for the attacks in the name of Al-Qaeda.

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Africa North

Judge quizzes Madrid attack suspect in Morocco

2006-04-25

The judge in charge of the inquiry into the Madrid train bombings travelled to Morocco to interrogate a suspect in the case. Judge Juan del Olmo went to a jail in Salé, a city near the capital Rabat, to question Mimoun Belhadj. "Rodrigo! My number three, no, number four truncheon, por favor. Perhaps even the number five. After all, we *are* in Morocco." Belhadj is the brother of one of the 29 men accused of the rush-hour bomb attacks in which 191 people died and more than 1,700 were injured in March 2004. The unusual move was made with the cooperation of the Moroccan authorities. "Yes, effendi, the soundproofing is quite adequate here." Del Olmo, along with a number of Moroccan judges, interrogated Belhadj as part of an international tribunal. Belhadj is currently serving two years in jail after being convicted of terrorist offences. He was extradited from Syria. He is the brother of Youssef Belhadj, who was extradited from Belgium to face charges in Spain relating to the Madrid bomb attacks carried out by Islamic extremists. Spanish police have been hunting both brothers, who are allegedly members of the Moroccan Islamic Combat Group (GICM), which was said to have been involved in the Madrid bombings. They allegedly fled to Belgium after the attacks. Del Olmo is also due to travel to France to interrogate another suspect in the case.

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Europe

More on the 3/11 indictments

2006-04-12

A Spanish judge indicted 29 people Tuesday for alleged roles in the deadly 2004 Madrid train bombings and concluded that the attack was carried out by a local radical Islamic cell that was inspired but not directed by al-Qaeda. After a two-year investigation, Judge Juan del Olmo handed down a 1,471-page report and the first indictments, charging six people with 191 counts of terrorist murder and 1,755 attempted murders. The 23 other people were charged with collaborating in the plot. Explosives-filled backpacks were detonated by cell phones on the morning of March 11, 2004, ripping apart four rush-hour commuter trains. One hundred ninety-one people died and 1,800 were injured in what remains Europe's second-worst attack by terrorists after the 1988 downing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. The bombers' alleged ideological leader and six other men blew themselves up three weeks after the attack as police closed in on their Madrid apartment hide-out. But several of the people indicted Tuesday are described as senior members of the conspiracy. They include Jamal Zougam, 32, a Moroccan. He is accused as a material author of the synchronized attack and charged with murder, attempted murder and membership in a terrorist group. According to the indictment, Zougam supplied the cell phones that detonated the 10 backpacks used in the attacks. In addition, four witnesses identified him as having placed dark blue bags under different seats on trains that blew up. Youssef Belhadj, Hassam El Haski and Rabei Osman Sayed Ahmed -- known as "Mohamed the Egyptian" and currently on trial in Italy on separate terrorism charges -- are also accused of membership in a terror group, murder and attempted murder. Jose Emilio Suarez Trashorras, a former miner who allegedly provided the bombers with plastic explosives stolen from a mine in northern Spain, was charged with 192 murders. They included that of a policeman who was killed during the attempt to arrest suspected bombers at the Madrid apartment. The judge discussed the local nature of the conspiracy at length in his report. "If it is true that the operative capacity of al Qaeda has lessened in the past few years, it is not noticeable in a sustained decrease in its activity," del Olmo wrote. "From the point of view of the threat, regional networks and local groups have acquired greater importance." Del Olmo highlighted a trend of Moroccans and Algerians working together in radical Islamic groups in Spain. "It is a very noteworthy change, given that until relatively recently Algerian groups in Spain were homogenous in so far as nationality, and the relationship between Moroccan and Algerian jihadists was scarce," he wrote. The 29 indicted people include 15 Moroccans, one Algerian, one Egyptian, one Lebanese, one Syrian and one Syrian with Spanish nationality. Also indicted were nine Spaniards, most on charges of having helped the bombers obtain their explosives. According to Del Olmo, the bombers studied a report posted on the Web site of the Global Islamic Media Front in which a committee of al-Qaeda experts suggested an attack in Spain before the general elections of March 14, 2004. At the time, Spain had 1,300 troops in Iraq as part of the U.S.-led forces. The indictment details Spanish intelligence warnings to then-Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar that Spain was one of a group of European countries at high risk of an Islamic terrorist attack. The bombings took place three days before the election. Aznar initially blamed the Basque separatist group ETA. But as evidence mounted of Islamic involvement, Spanish voters turned against Aznar and unseated his Popular Party. The Socialist Party, led by Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, won the election and quickly fulfilled a campaign promise to pull Spanish troops out of Iraq. Some people in Spain have speculated that ETA helped the bombers in some way. The indictment draws no such link. "The judge has only addressed what evidence there is," a court spokeswoman said. A trial is likely to begin next year.

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Europe

29 indicted in connection with 3/11

2006-04-12

So much for the "no al-Qaeda link" that was being touted awhile back ... A Spanish judge indicted 29 people on Tuesday in connection with the Madrid train bombings two years ago, suggesting that the group attacked Spain for its support of the American-led invasion of Iraq and for its increasingly aggressive police investigations of Islamic radical groups. The indictment, part of a long-awaited report about the attacks running nearly 1,500 pages, did not assert directly that the plotters had been motivated by anger at the policies of Spain's government. But the judge who wrote the report, Juan del Olmo, noted that the timing of the attacks, March 11, was just three days before Spain's general election. José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero of the Socialist Party won that election in a surprise victory and fulfilled his campaign pledge to withdraw Spanish troops immediately after taking office in April. Five of the men indicted Tuesday were charged with carrying out or conspiring to carry out the attacks, done with 10 strategically placed bombs that exploded on four commuter trains, killing 191 people and wounding about 1,800. A sixth man was accused of acting as a "necessary collaborator," while the rest were charged with belonging to or aiding a terrorist group, or contributing to the attacks through support roles like providing explosives or falsifying documents. The trial is expected to begin next spring. Judge del Olmo's report largely summarized provisional findings he had made in filings over the past two years. It asserted that the cell that carried out the attacks was made up mostly of Moroccan radicals, several with ties to Al Qaeda and to the Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group, a militant organization seeking to establish an Islamist state in Morocco. Spanish investigators have said that the cell came together in Spain initially under the guidance of a Syrian named Imad Eddin Barakat Yarkas, also known as Abu Dahdah, who was convicted in September by a Spanish court for conspiring to commit the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States and for leading a Qaeda cell in Spain. He was sentenced to 27 years in prison. After Mr. Yarkas and several followers were arrested in 2001, investigators have said, the group reconstituted itself under the leadership of Sarhane ben Abdelmajid Fakhet, a former Tunisian graduate student in economics who in 2003 began calling for an attack on Spain in part because of its support of American policies toward Iraq. There is no indication in Judge del Olmo's report that Mr. Fakhet or Jamal Ahmidan, a Moroccan identified as the operational head of the cell, had any direct links to the top leadership of Al Qaeda. But in explaining the major influences on the group, Judge del Olmo cited a document posted on a Web site run by Global Islamic Media Front, a group widely seen as a front for Al Qaeda. The document, apparently posted in late 2003, called for attacks on Spain before the general elections in March, saying they would help drive a wedge between the Spanish public, which overwhelmingly opposed the invasion of Iraq, and the government of former Prime Minister José María Aznar, who supported the invasion and contributed troops. Judge del Olmo also suggested that the Madrid attacks were partly a response to a crackdown on Islamic radical groups by the Spanish police that began in the late 1990's. That crackdown, which included the arrest of Mr. Yarkas and the breakup of his cell in Madrid, disrupted a major logistical base for Islamic radicals in Europe, Spanish investigators say.

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Europe

Judge says local Islamic cell planned Madrid massacre

2006-04-10

The judge investigating the Madrid train bombings will conclude 191 people were killed by a local Islamic cell inspired by al-Qaeda, it was reported. The Spanish daily El Pais reported high court judge Juan del Olmo's indictment will say the Islamic terrorists were inspired by a radical website called Global Islamic Media (GIM). The 1,000-page indictment, due to be published on Tuesday, will reject any involvement of the Basque terrorist organisation ETA, claims the paper. The terrorists behind the attacks were inspired by the messages on the GIM website which specifically advocated attacks on Spain before the general election of 14 March 2004. The newspaper reports two of the ringleaders who led the attack, Jamal Ahimidan, called El Chino, and Serhane Abdelmajid Fakhet, known as El Tunecino, consulted the website between September and December 2003. The website included a document recommending attacks on Spain before the elections. It said: "It is necessary to make the most use of the upcoming elections. We think the Spanish government will not be able to tolerate more than two attacks, three at the most, after which it will have to pull its troops out of Iraq." Three days after the train bombings which also injured more than 1,500 people, Spaniards voted in the Socialist government which promptly withdrew troops from Iraq. About 30 people are expected to be formally charged in relation to the attacks. A trial, expected to last up to 10 months, will take place later this year or next.

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Europe

3/11 indictments to be issued soon

2006-04-10

After more than two years of delays and rampant speculation about his findings, a Spanish judge is expected to issue indictments early this week in connection with the March 11, 2004, train bombings in Madrid that killed 191 people and wounded at least 1,000. The bombings, the deadliest terrorist attack in the history of Western Europe since the downing of a Pan American Airlines flight over Scotland in 1988, have led to the arrests of about 120 people and the provisional jailing of 24. It is not clear how many will be indicted. Local news reports estimate that the number of indictments will be between 30 and 40. The judge handling the case, Juan del Olmo, has shunned publicity throughout the investigation, hardly speaking with the press and keeping much of his work from public view. Still, the broad outlines of his conclusions are evident in several of his provisional court filings, which attribute the attacks to Islamic radicals, most of them Moroccans and many with ties to Al Qaeda. According to the filings, the group appears to have come together in Spain, initially under the guidance of a Syrian named Imad Eddin Barakat Yarkas, also known as Abu Dahdah, who was convicted by a Spanish court in September of conspiring to commit the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the United States and of leading a cell of Al Qaeda in Spain. After Yarkas was arrested in 2001, leadership of the group eventually passed to a younger radical, a former Tunisian graduate student in economics named Sarhane Ben Abdelmajid Fakhet, who in early 2003 began calling for an attack on Spain in part because of its support of American policies toward Iraq, the documents say. Fakhet and his co-leader, Jamal Ahmidan, the man who investigators have called the operational head of the cell, blew themselves up along with five other members of the group when their apartment near Madrid was surrounded by the Spanish police about three weeks after the train bombings. Investigators working with del Olmo say that practically all of the principal members of the group are now dead or in custody, and that they have unraveled most of what the group did in the days leading up to the attacks, largely through information gathered from phone records. What they have not established, at least not publicly, is the existence of a link between the group and the top leadership of Al Qaeda. Many investigators say that the typically horizontal structure of Islamic terrorist networks suggests that the group probably conceived and carried out the train bombings without any order or message from Osama bin Laden or his top lieutenants. Del Olmo has been publicly criticized by senior judges for the slow pace of his investigation, leading him to set his own deadline of April 10 for issuing the indictments. A court official said that the judge was likely to miss the deadline by a day, suggesting he would publish his findings on Tuesday rather than Monday. The trial is expected to begin in late summer or in early autumn. One person has been convicted so far, a minor identified by the initials G.M.V. who pleaded guilty in November 2004 to having helped provide the explosives used in the attacks. Del Olmo's investigation has been the subject of intense partisan maneuverings almost from the outset. Members of the center-right Popular Party, which was in power at the time of the attacks, continue to suggest that ETA, the militant Basque separatist group, was involved - a claim they made in the days immediately after the attacks. The governing Socialists call this reckless disregard for the facts, contending that the Popular Party is trying to fend off criticism that the attacks were a response from Muslim radicals to Spanish support for the American invasion of Iraq. While being careful not to directly blame the previous government for the attacks, saying that only terrorists are responsible for terrorism, the Socialists have argued that the policy of supporting the invasion of Iraq put Spain at greater risk of attack from Islamic militants. The police investigators have said repeatedly that there is no evidence indicating that ETA participated in the train bombings.

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Europe

Willful ignorance on the Madrid bombings

2006-03-22

Therefore we say that to force the Spanish government to withdraw from Iraq the resistance has to measured by painful strikes against their forces and accompanying this a informative campaign clarifying the truth of the situation inside Iraq, and we must absolutely gain from the approaching date of general elections in Spain in the third month of the coming year. We believe that the Spanish government will not endure two or three attacks as a maximum limit because it will be forced to withdraw afterwards due to the popular pressure on it, for if its forces remain after these strikes it is almost certain the Socialist forces will win the elections, as one of the main goals of the Socialist party will be the withdrawal of the Spanish troops . . . the dominoes will fall quickly, although the basic problem will remain of toppling the first piece. -Iraq al-Jihad, circa August 2003 "MADRID TRAIN BOMBINGS PROBE FINDS NO AL-QAEDA LINK" was the headline of a widely-circulated Associated Press story two weeks ago. Citing a "Spanish intelligence chief" and a "Western official intimately involved in counterterrorism measures in Spain," the AP reported that "A two-year probe into the Madrid train bombings concludes the Islamic terrorists who carried out the blasts were homegrown radicals acting on their own rather than at the behest of Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network." While acknowledging that the masterminds behind the attack were "likely motivated by bin Laden's October 2003 call for attacks on European countries that supported the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq" and that "the plotters had links to other Muslim radicals in western Europe," the AP cited the Spanish intelligence chief as saying that there were "no telephone calls between the Madrid bombers and al Qaeda and no money transfers" and "no evidence they were in contact with the al Qaeda leader's inner circle." Such a view is by no means new. Indeed, in June 2005 Dateline NBC reported that "Madrid is cited as the key turning point in the evolution of Islamic terror. Initially, Spanish and U.S. counterterrorism officials sought links between al-Qaeda (or, as the CIA now describes it, 'al-Qaeda Central'). But quickly they realized there weren't any. . . . It required no central direction from the mountains of Pakistan, simply a charismatic leader with links to men trained in the war in Afghanistan against the Soviet Union." SUCH A VIEW is no doubt attractive, but there are serious problems with it. As the March 11 Commission (an independent Spanish investigation into the attacks parallel to the U.S. 9/11 Commission) noted, there were numerous connections between the masterminds of the 3/11 attacks, al Qaeda, and a number of known al Qaeda associate groups including Ansar al-Islam, the Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group (and its offshoot Salafi Jihad), and Abu Musab Zarqawi's al Qaeda in Iraq (then al-Tawhid wal Jihad). There is also the al Qaeda strategy document Iraq al-Jihad, which appears to lay out in detail plans for attacks in Spain several months prior to the country's elections. According to the Norwegian Defense Research Establishment (FFI)'s report on the motivations of Islamist terrorism in Europe, "The researchers from the FFI consider it likely that the terrorists behind the Madrid massacre were familiar with the contents of this strategy document" as well as that "the evidence leaves few doubts that the attacks in Madrid were carried out by al-Qaeda affiliates in Spain." Most importantly, the March 11 Commission identified former Egyptian army explosives expert Rabei Osman Sayed Ahmed as one of the planners of the Madrid bombings. According to an arrest warrant issued by Spanish judge Juan del Olmo, Ahmed is "a suspected member of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad" who "took over leadership of a group of followers of extremist Islamist ideology, supporters of the Jihad and of Osama bin Laden" while living in Madrid. Now on trial in Milan for international terrorism, Ahmed was wiretapped by Italian authorities telling an associate that "The Madrid attack is my project and those who died as martyrs are my dearest friends." Given that Egyptian Islamic Jihad is currently headed by al Qaeda second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahiri, one would think that such a statement from one of its members, to say nothing of various statements from senior Spanish and Italian law enforcement and judicial officials, would settle the issue of al Qaeda involvement in the Madrid train bombings once and for all. (Moreover, a key piece of the Spanish intelligence chief's claims, that no money transfers occurred between al Qaeda and the masterminds of the Madrid bombings, may also be in doubt. Both El Mundo and Corriere della Sera reported in September 2004 that Ahmed stated in a conversation wiretapped by Italian authorities that during his time in Madrid he was being financed by Sheikh Salman al-Awdah, a radical Saudi cleric who has been described as a "friend" of Osama bin Laden and been praised by the al Qaeda leader for his support in a number of al Qaeda propaganda videos.) THE SPANISH INTELLIGENCE CHIEF'S CLAIM that there was no al Qaeda link to the Madrid bombings might be better understood within the context of Spanish domestic politics. After all, if the goal of the attacks was to topple the Popular Party government in order to bring about a Spanish withdrawal from Iraq, it would seem that al Qaeda was successful both in achieving the desired results and reading the Spanish political scene--which the Zapatero government might, understandably, be loathe to admit. What is alarming is that U.S. counterterrorism officials have apparently also missed these tell-tale signs of al Qaeda involvement in connection with a major terrorist attack in a European capital. Although this might not be very surprising: According to a May 2004 article in U.S. News & World Report, when asked about Iraq al-Jihad "Analysts at the Central Intelligence Agency also found the article unremarkable, 'a document like any number of other documents,' says one intelligence official." Perhaps it was, but it was almost certainly a document whose online publication and dissemination had tragic consequences for the Spanish people. ANY NUMBER OF INVESTIGATIONS into U.S. intelligence failures prior to 9/11 have revealed key gaps in the understanding of al Qaeda. As the FFI report on Islamist terrorism in Europe makes clear, there are no strict organizational division between al Qaeda and its various allies and associate groups, thus making the overlap between them fluid and difficult for investigators to track. To rule out an al Qaeda link to the Madrid bombers at this stage would seem counterintuitive in light of the information currently available from any number of credible sources. For instance, Judge Juan del Olmo, who is heading up the official Spanish investigation into the attacks, has said that the Madrid bombings were "were carried out by a local cell linked to a international terrorist network . . . of Islamic fanatics which planted the bombs had links stretching through France, Belgium, Italy, Morocco and to Iraq." Is it that much to ask that the U.S. intelligence community be at least as informed as members of the Spanish judiciary? Dan Darling is a counterterrorism consultant for the Manhattan Institute Center for Policing Terrorism.

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Europe

3/11 bombers planned further attacks

2006-03-11

Almost two years to the day since al-Qaeda linked bombers killed 191 passengers and injured almost 1,000 in devastating train bombings the Spanish capital on 11 March, 2004, it has emerged that the bombers had planned to carry out further attacks in Spain, according to disclosures published on Friday in the Spanish daily, ABC. A particuarly disturbing relevation in the ABC report is that other terrorist attacks were planned on Spanish soil. Investigators reportedly found details of planned attacks by the Madrid cell on the computer of one of the bombing suspects, Jamal Ahmidan, known as 'the Chinaman'. Among the cell's possible future targets were an English school in Madrid, and the Avila and Toledo synagogues, ABC reported. Investigators found a kind of manual on how to organise a terrorist group that Ahmidan had downloaded onto his computer one week after the deadly attacks from an 'online al-Battar training camp' based in Saudi Arabia. The 'instructions' received by Ahmidan included how to form a terror command structure in a large city. The manual contains information on the composition of an al-Qaeda cell. This needs to be made up of five groups: the leadership, information and logistics staff, operatives who carry out attacks, and financial officers. Only the leadership of a cell can know the objective of an attacks, according to the manual. Just a few days after Ahmidan downloaded the manual, police found 12 kilogrammes of explosives near Toledo, on the tracks of the high-speed Madrid-Seville express train. Ahmidan and several other Madrid train bombing suspects blew themselves up in a flat in a Madrid suburb when police moved in to arrest them three weeks after the bombings. A police special operations officer was killed and 18 police officers were injured in the blast. The second anniversary of the Madrid train bombings will be marked in a low-key climate, with little pomp and ceremony - at the request of relations of the victims. More than 200 of the attacks still need medical assistance, and a further 264 need psychological help. On Friday night prime minister Jose Luis Zapatero and King Juan Carlos and Queen Sofia will attend a memorial concert for victims of the Madrid attacks and the 7 July 2005 bombings of the British capital London's transport system that killed 54 and injured 700. No bombing suspect has yet stood trial. Judge Juan del Olmo is expected to present his first indictments in the complex investigation by 10 April: some 30 people out of 116 suspects, many of whom are Moroccan, are expected to be charged. Del Olmo and the National Court have been warned that unless the investigation is stepped up, some of the 25 defendants currently detained might have to be released from custody before any trial ends. Spain's 11th March Association of Terrorism Victims president, Pilar Manjon said on Thursday she was starting legal action against del Olmo. Manjon is angry that del Olmo has so far asked only 10 of the hundreds of victims of the deadly attacks to testify before him.

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