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Britain

Who paid to free Abu Qatada?

2008-05-09

A former British hostage held in Iraq today revealed that he helped pay the bail for jailed radical preacher Abu Qatada. Norman Kember, a 77-year-old peace campaigner from Pinner, said he gave the money out of “kindness” in return for Qatada's help while he was being held by his kidnappers. Mr Kember was saved by the SAS after four months in captivity at a cost of hundreds of thousands of pounds. He was criticised after his release over claims — which he later denied — that he had failed to thank his SAS rescuers. Extremist cleric Qatada is viewed by the Home Office as a serious danger to the public. Officials are trying to deport him to Jordan but yesterday he won an appeal against his detention and will now be freed on bail under a 22 hour-a-day curfew. Home Secretary Jacqui Smith and opposition parties have hit out at the ruling amid concern that the release of Qatada — once described as Osama bin Laden's right-hand man in Europe — will pose a threat to national security. Today, however, Mr Kember said he felt that Qatada should be freed because the British authorities had failed to prosecute him. He said that if Qatada, who has been in jail awaiting deportation since 2002, had been convicted then he should serve his sentence, but in the absence of a trial it was wrong to continue to detain him. “If you want to keep him in jail you have to have good reasons for doing it otherwise al Qaeda have you — if you don't follow your process of justice,” he said. Mr Kember said he had given hundreds, rather than thousands, of pounds and had sent Qatada a copy of his book, Hostage In Iraq. He added that he expected to be criticised. He said that he hoped Qatada's release “would encourage a conversation with Muslims” and greater understanding of the religion and urged more people to try to speak to the cleric to “understand what his position is and why he takes it”. He added: “I always think we are in danger of demonising Islam and I think we have to have a more open discussion about these things. The Government obviously doesn't.” Qatada, a Palestinian-Jordanian, was convicted in his absence in Jordan of terrorist offences in the 1990s. Judges last week blocked a government bid to deport him back to Jordan because of the risk that evidence obtained by torture would be used to prosecute him, although the Home Office is mounting an appeal. Mr Kember and three other men were kidnapped in Baghdad in November 2005 by a group calling itself the Swords of Truth Brigade. One of the hostages, American Tom Fox, was murdered by his captors. After his rescue, the head of the British Army, General Sir Mike Jackson, said he was “saddened” by Mr Kember's apparent lack of gratitude towards his SAS saviours.

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Britain

Islamic preacher Abu Qatada is bailed

2008-05-09

A firebrand preacher once described as “Osama bin Laden’s right-hand man in Europe” is due to be freed within days after being granted bail by an immigration tribunal. So is England officially doomed yet, or what? Abu Qatada, who last month defeated the Government’s efforts to deport him to Jordan on terror charges, will be subject to a 22-hour curfew when he is released from Long Lartin high-security prison. Ooooooh. A curfew... Jacqui Smith, the Home Secretary, said she was “extremely disappointed” at the decision and promised “all steps necessary to protect the public”. Some of the bail money is thought to have been put up by Norman Kember, the Christian peace worker who was held hostage in Baghdad for four months from November 2005 by a group of insurgents. Qatada had made a video appeal for his release. Stockholm syndrome ... The bail decision by the Special Immigration Advisory Tribunal is a fresh blow to the Government’s anti-terror policies. Last month, the Home Office was forced to abandon plans to deport 12 Libyan fanatics, leaving a memorandum of understanding with Libya, signed in October 2005, effectively in tatters. The rulings mean that not a single international terrorist has been forcibly removed from this country. Nearly three years after the 7/7 attacks, the only Islamic extremists to depart are eight Algerians who left voluntarily. Qatada 45, has been convicted in his absence in Jordan of involvement with terror attacks in 1998 and of plotting to plant bombs at the Millennium. The radical cleric once called on British Muslims to martyr themselves, and tapes of his sermons were found in a flat in Germany used by some of the September 11 hijackers. Mrs Smith said: “Public safety is our main priority and we will take all steps necessary to protect the public. We will ensure that necessary steps are taken to ensure the safety of the public. I am already seeking to appeal the Court of Appeal’s decision that it is not safe to deport Qatada and we will continue with deportation action with this and the other Jordanian cases.” Qatada could be freed within days and it is thought he will return to his family, who are understood to be living in Acton, West London. Once he has been released, the Jordanian father-of-five, can expect to receive £1,000 a month in benefit payments. The taxpayer will also face a bill of tens of thousands of pounds to keep the cleric under 24-hour watch. David Davis, the Shadow Home Secretary, said: “This whole situation totally undermines the Government’s assurances that memoranda of understanding are the solution to deporting terror suspects. The Government should at last answer our calls to focus on prevention and prosecution rather than just trying to deport these individuals once they are here.” Anejem Choudary, a former senior member of extreme Muslim group Al-Muhajiroun and the butt boy lieutenant to self-styled radical cleric Omar Bakri, said the freeing of Qatada was “excellent news”. He said:“I think the decision is absolutely correct. He was a victim of total oppression and what happened to him was wrong. There’s no reason at all why he should have been held in custody in the first place. He deserves not only an apology but compensation. He’s a recognised Muslim scholar and he’s never been prosecuted for any offences. I believe he deserves compensation for all his suffering.” When Qatada was arrested by anti-terrorism police officers in February 2001, he had £170,000 cash in his possession, including £805 in an envelope marked “For the Mujahedin in Chechnya”. However he went on the run in December 2001 when new laws were brought in that allowed terror suspects to be detained without charge or trial. Qatada became one of Britain’s most wanted men. Over six feet tall and weighing more than 20 stone, he was an unlikely fugitive but he avoided capture for 10 months. Qatada, whose real name is Omar Mahmoud Mohammed Othman, was finally arrested in an armed raid on a council house in south London in October 2002 and held in Belmarsh prison in south east London.

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Iraq

Covert British unit a 'secret weapon' in Iraq

2007-02-06

Deep inside the heart of the Green Zone, the heavily fortified administrative compound in Baghdad, lies one of the most carefully guarded secrets of the war in Iraq. Not anymore. Thanks for that, LONDON SUNDAY TELEGRAPH. It is a cell from a small and anonymous British army unit that goes by the innocuous name of the Joint Support Group (JSG), and it has proved to be one of the coalition's most effective and deadly weapons in the fight against terror. Its members -- servicemen and women of all ranks recruited from all three of the British armed forces -- are trained to turn hardened terrorists into coalition spies using methods developed on the streets of Northern Ireland, where the British Army managed to infiltrate the Irish Republican Army (IRA) at almost every level. During the long-running unrest in Northern Ireland, the JSG operated under the cover name of the Force Research Unit (FRU), which from the early 1980s to the late 1990s managed to penetrate the very heart of the IRA. Since war broke out in Iraq in 2003, the cell has been responsible for running dozens of Iraqi double agents. Working alongside the Special Air Service (SAS) and the American Delta Force as part of the Baghdad-based counterterrorist unit known as Task Force Black, the cell members have supplied intelligence that has saved hundreds of lives and resulted in some of the most notable successes against the myriad terror groups fighting in Iraq. Last week, sources said, intelligence from the JSG led to a series of successful operations against Sunni militia groups in southern Baghdad. Information obtained by the cell also is understood to have inspired one of the most successful operations carried out by Task Force Black, in November 2005, when SAS snipers fatally shot three would-be suicide bombers. The killing of Abu Musab Zarqawi, the leader of al Qaeda in Iraq until his death in June, came after intelligence obtained by the JSG, as did the rescue of kidnapped British peace campaigner, Norman Kember. JSG operators deal with dozens of Iraqis every week who are prepared, for a variety of reasons, to become informers. "Some Iraqis come to us because they are simply fed up with the violence," one source said. "They may have had members of their families murdered, tortured or kidnapped. Unlike much of the middle class, which has already fled the country, they may be too poor to leave and so they come to us to see if they can make a difference." Risking their own lives, and those of their friends and relatives to do so. They also fight who stay in the shadows and feed helpful information.

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Europe

European governments sanctioned $45million in ransom

2006-05-22

That's $45 million in the pockets of the jihadis and their ilk, boys and girls. Think about it. FRANCE, Italy and Germany sanctioned the payment of $45 million in deals to free nine hostages abducted in Iraq, according to documents seen by The Times. All three governments have publicly denied paying ransom money. But according to the documents, held by security officials in Baghdad who have played a crucial role in hostage negotiations, sums from $2.5 million to $10 million per person have been paid over the past 21 months. Among those said to have received cash ransoms was the gang responsible for seizing British hostages including Kenneth Bigley, the murdered Liverpool engineer. The list of payments has also been seen by Western diplomats, who are angered at the behaviour of the three governments, arguing that it encourages organised crime gangs to grab more foreign captives. “In theory we stand together in not rewarding kidnappers, but in practice it seems some administrations have parted with cash and so it puts other foreign nationals at risk from gangs who are confident that some governments do pay,” one senior envoy in the Iraqi capital said. More than 250 foreigners have been abducted since the US-led invasion in 2003. At least 44 have been killed; 135 were released, three escaped, six were rescued and the fate of the others remains unknown. A number of other governments, including those of Turkey, Romania, Sweden and Jordan, are said to have paid for their hostages to be freed, as have some US companies with lucrative reconstruction contracts in Iraq. At least four businessmen with dual US and Iraqi nationality have been returned, allegedly in exchange for payments by their employers. This money is often disguised as “ expenses” paid to trusted go-betweens for costs that they claim to incur. The release this month of Rene Braunlich and Thomas Nitzschke, two German engineers, for a reported $5 million payment prompted senior Iraqi security officials to seek talks with leading Western diplomats in the capital on how to handle hostage release. When the men returned home, Alaa al-Hashimi, the Iraqi Ambassador to Germany, revealed that the German Government handed over “a large amount” to free the pair after 99 days in captivity. The kidnappers are understood to have asked for $10 million. Liam Fox, the Shadow Defence Secretary, called last night for an immediate end to the practice. “The idea that Western governments would have paid ransoms is extremely disturbing,” he said. “It is essential that governments never give in to blackmail from terrorists or criminals if security is ever to be maintained.” Michael Moore, a Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesman, said: “These governments have created a kidnappers’ charter. Everyone from outside Iraq working in the country becomes more vulnerable as a result.” Police say that about 30 people a day are abducted in Baghdad. Most Iraqis taken are returned once their families pay a ransom. An Iraqi counter-terrorism official, who asked not to be named, said that local experts are usually excluded from negotiations involving Westerners. He said: “Too often governments and their military keep secrets from each other , and certainly from us, and do what they want including paying out millions, no matter what their stated policy on ransoms.” Western diplomats claim that the reason for their secrecy is the suspicion that some in the Iraqi security apparatus are too closely associated with militias and some of the criminal gangs to be trusted. The family of Bayan Solagh Jabr, who was Interior Minister until the announcement on Saturday of a provisional government, was among the victims of the kidnap gangs when his sister, Eman, was abducted in January. She is said to have been freed a fortnight later after a ransom was agreed. Mr Jabr is now Finance Minister. The mutual distrust is hindering efforts to wage an effective war against the underworld gangs responsible for most of the abuctions of Westerners, the Baghdad official said. At least two crime gangs are alleged to have sold on some of their foreign captives to militant groups who use the hostages for propaganda purposes rather than obtaining ransoms. Britain has never paid to free its citizens, despite pressure from the employees of some hostages, but is understood to have paid intermediaries “expenses” for their efforts to make contact with the kidnappers. British officials have been criticised for giving the kidnappers of the peace activist Norman Kember time to escape to avoid the risk of a gun battle with Special Forces troops sent to rescue him and his two fellow captives from a house in central Baghdad in March. Only when Jill Carroll, an American journalist, was freed eight days later did intelligence experts discover that she had been held by the same notorious crime family, who were working with Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the wanted al-Qaeda leader in Iraq. That revelation infuriated US officials in Baghdad, who had let Britain take the lead in tracing and freeing Professor Kember, 74, and his two Canadian colleagues. FBI agents are investigating claims that this gang sold some of its hostages, including American contractors and aid workers, to militant Islamic groups. The gang is reported to have had a hand in organising the abduction of three British hostages, Margaret Hassan, Mr Bigley and Professor Kember, and three Italian journalists. Figures involved in secret talks to resolve hostage cases told The Times that Mrs Hassan, an aid worker who had converted to Islam and taken Iraqi citizenship, was murdered soon after Tony Blair made it clear in a television broadcast seen on an Arab satellite channel that the Government would not pay a ransom. Wealthy benefactors had signalled their readiness to pay for her release. A key figure in brokering some of the deals has been Sheikh Abdel Salam al-Qubaisi, a militant Sunni cleric and senior figure in the Association of Muslim Scholars. Professor Kember and his party had just visited the group when he was abducted last November. details of payments at the link

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Iraq

British Paras In US Uniforms Protect SAS Ops In Baghdad

2006-04-24

British paratroopers secretly operating in support of the SAS in Iraq are using American uniforms, weapons and vehicles as part of their cover, The Daily Telegraph has learned. Although John Reid, the Defence Secretary, only announced this week that the Special Forces Support Group (SFSG) had become operational, a company of more than 100 paratroopers has been working for six months in Baghdad. They have reportedly become so successful that American special forces have called on their help. The SFSG was formed mainly because it was found that small groups of highly trained SAS troopers did not have enough firepower to take on large groups of Iraqi and Afghan terrorists. The unit has already seen a substantial amount of action in Baghdad. Whenever the SAS goes on raids to apprehend terrorists in highly dangerous areas of Baghdad, the Paras are used to provide perimeter security. Arriving in US Humvees, dressed in American army fatigues and armed with C7 Diemaco guns - a Canadian made version of the M16, the men have fought several battles with insurgents while protecting SAS colleagues. "The SAS are doing the smash and grab but all the contacts are happening on the perimeter and there are a serious amount of rounds going down the range," a Parachute Regiment source said. "They are making a really good name for themselves with the Hereford blokes and the Americans. If the shit hits the fan and the SAS need them, the boys are there as a quick reaction force." The troops were also believed to have been used to provide a security cordon as part of Task Force Maroon when the SAS rescued the peace campaigner Norman Kember and two other hostages. The troops deployed to Baghdad at the end of last year after undergoing specialist training at the SAS headquarters in Hereford, including the use of American weapons and equipment. "They wear US uniforms so they can blend in in Baghdad where a British paratrooper would stick out and draw unwanted attention," an intelligence source said. "But they don't have their hair cuts 'high and tight', don't strut around like Americans and are certainly not trying to speak with American accents. They are loving it with all the American kit, and you can't keep them out of the PX shop [US military duty-free shops]." The SFSG is mainly based on the 500 men of the 1 Bn The Parachute Regiment supplemented by a company of about 100 Royal Marines and a similar number of men from the RAF Regiment. The group is based at St Athan, near Cardiff. Good lads!

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Great White North

Canadian special forces were involved in Iraq rescue

2006-03-26

While Canadians rejoiced at the news that two of their citizens were rescued from captivity in Iraq, some were surprised to learn Canadian special forces were involved in the mission and curious as to how many troops are on the ground. Prime Minister Stephen Harper told reporters Thursday that a handful of Canadian troops have been stationed in Iraq since the beginning of the U.S.-led invasion and occupation, which is still widely unpopular at home. But he insisted the special forces who helped rescue Canadians James Loney and Harmeet Singh Sooden, along with Briton Norman Kember, were in Iraq only temporarily with the express goal of obtaining the hostages' release. The former Liberal Party government declined in 2003 to join the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq unless it came under the U.N. umbrella, and many Canadians have been critical of U.S. methods in Washington's war on terror. Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay said about 20 Canadian troops and other personnel were in Iraq working quietly since shortly after the kidnappings of the Christian Peacemaker Teams workers on Nov. 26. "We were there with our very best," he told The Globe and Mail for Friday editions. "We had everyone fully engaged in this operation from day one." The Royal Canadian Mounted Police, intelligence officers and diplomats were also involved, he said. "Canada should not (be) and is not passive when it comes to its own citizens and the protection of their lives," MacKay said. It is believed that members of Canada's elite and secretive Joint Task Force 2 were also involved, but the government would neither confirm nor deny this. Harper did confirm Thursday, shortly after the men were rescued, that an unspecified number of Canadians have been embedded with coalition forces since the beginning of the war. "I'm not free to say anything more than that because this involves national security," he said. He denied Canadian troops were involved in the war, however, saying: "Any involvement that Canada has had on the ground in this particular matter was obviously targeted simply at the issue of Canadian hostages." Canadian Defense spokeswoman Lt. Morgan Bailey told The Associated Press on Friday that only a handful of Canadian troops were on the ground in Iraq. She said one soldier is serving with a U.N. assistance team helping to draft a new constitution and coordinate humanitarian operations; three other Canadian soldiers are on an exchange with British forces. "They do their normal job, only with the British unit," she said. "If their job is to be an engineer, they would do that job with the British." But she declined to say whether there were special forces in Iraq. "It's our policy not to speak about special operations abroad," she said. In March 2003, when Parliament was debating whether to send troops to Iraq - some Conservatives believed it was imperative to help the Bush administration remove Saddam Hussein from power - several MPs said special forces had secretly been on the ground in Afghanistan, though Prime Minister Jean Chretien's government denied it. Some Canadians were also surprised to learn that a dozen troops had been embedded with British and U.S. troops during the invasion of Iraq, in what are known as training exchanges. Eric Walton, foreign affairs critic for the Green Party of Canada, said he didn't think most Canadians would oppose Canadian Forces in Iraq to help their own. "My feeling is, you don't need permission for a rescue mission, if it's in and out," Walton said. "But the issue I have a problem with is the way the invasion occurred, against international law, and I think Canada should have taken a stand and pulled its troops out of those exchanges." John Pike, a defense analyst and director of GlobalSecurity.org, a military policy think tank in Alexandria, Va., asked: What's the big deal? "It would seem to me that the scandal would have been if they hadn't been there," Pike said. "The lives of Canadian nationals were at stake. If there had been no Canadians involved in this and it had come to grief, then the outrage would have been: `You allowed trigger-happy American cowboys to kill our people.'" He said it is common for countries to send their special forces quietly to train in live combat situations, as the experience is invaluable. "I certainly have the sense that there is a much larger special operations presence in Iraq than is widely understood," Pike said. "This type of combat experience is precious."

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Iraq

Released hostages refuse to help their rescuers

2006-03-25

The three peace activists freed by an SAS-led coalition force after being held hostage in Iraq for four months refused to co-operate fully with an intelligence unit sent to debrief them, a security source claimed yesterday. The claim has infuriated those searching for other hostages. Neither the men nor the Canadian group that sent them to Iraq have thanked the people who saved them in any of their public statements. One of them, Norman Kember, 74, a retired physics professor, of Pinner, north-west London, was in Kuwait last night and was expected to return to Britain today. He is understood to have given some helpful information. He provided details of the semi-rural area north-west of Baghdad where he was held and confirmed that his captors were criminals, rather than insurgents. Their motive was believed to be money. The two Canadians kidnapped with Mr Kember - Harmeet Sooden, 32, and Jim Loney, 41 - were said to have been co-operative at first but less so on arriving at the British embassy in Baghdad after being given the opportunity to wash, eat and rest. Gratitude faded mighty quick, didn't it. Plus it was an embassy bed, embassy bath and embassy food. Previous hostages have been questioned on everything from what shoes their kidnappers wore to the number of mobile phones they had. The pacifist Christian Peacemaker Teams with which the men were visiting Iraq is opposed to the coalition's presence and has accused it of illegally detaining thousands of Iraqis. Jan Benvie, 51, an Edinburgh teacher who is due to go to Iraq with the organisation this summer, said: "We make clear that if we are kidnapped we do not want there to be force or any form of violence used to release us." It's the moral part of us that causes us to rescue hostages, something you wouldn't understand. Although the CPTs has welcomed the men's release, it has not thanked the rescuers in any of its statements. It blamed the kidnapping on the presence of foreign troops in the country, which was "responsible for so much pain and suffering in Iraq today". When told how angry the coalition was feeling, Claire Evans, a spokesman for the CPTs in America, said: "We are extremely grateful to everybody who had a role leading to the men's release." Then she went back to meowing. Mr Kember, in a statement through the embassy, said: "I have had the opportunity to have a shave, relax in the bath and a good English breakfast. I am very much looking forward to getting home to British soil and to being reunited with my family." He did not publicly thank his rescuers. Gen Sir Mike Jackson, the chief of the defence staff, told Channel 4 News: "I am slightly saddened that there does not seem to have been a note of gratitude for the soldiers who risked their lives to save those lives." Asked if he meant that Mr Kember had not said thank you, he said: "I hope he has and I have missed it." It emerged that about 50 soldiers, led by the SAS, including men from 1 Bn the Parachute Regiment and the Royal Marines, as well as American and Canadian special forces, entered the kidnap building at dawn. Canadian special forces in Iraq? That twitched the surprise meter. A deal had been struck with a man detained the previous night who was one of the leaders of the kidnappers. He was allowed a telephone call to warn his henchmen to leave the kidnap house. When the troops moved in and found the prisoners alive, they also let him go as promised.

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Iraq

56 Iraqis die in bombings, sectarian violence

2006-03-24

At least 56 Iraqis died in violence on Thursday, including a car bombing that killed 25 people in the third major attack on a police lockup in three days. A suicide car bomber detonated his explosives at the entrance to the Interior Ministry Major Crimes unit in Baghdad’s central Karradah district, killing 10 civilians and 15 policemen employed there, authorities said. Guess that gave them a major crime to investigate... A second car bomb hit a market area outside a Shia Muslim mosque in the mostly mixed Shia-Sunni neighbourhood of Shurta in southwest Baghdad. At least six people were killed and more than 20 wounded, many of them children, police said. Roadside bombs targeting police patrols killed four others – two policemen and two bystanders – in Baghdad and at least one policeman in Iskandariyah. Police said dozens were wounded. Another two policemen were killed and two were wounded when gunmen ambushed their convoy in north Baghdad, an attack that police said was an aborted attempt to free detainees who were being transferred to the northern city of Mosul. Elsewhere throughout the capital, two police were killed in gun battles with insurgents and two civilians – a private contractor and power plant employee – were gunned down in drive-by shootings. Fourteen more bodies were found in the continuing string of shadowy sectarian killings: six in the capital and eight brought in by US forces to a hospital in Fallujah, 65 kilometres west of Baghdad, police said. Back in the capital, a mortar round fell on a house wounding three civilians, police Lt Ziad Hassan said. Another civilian was seriously wounded by an Iraqi army patrol that was shooting in the air to clear traffic in the western neighbourhood of Yarmouk, police said. In a lightning operation, US and British forces on Thursday rescued three Western hostages held captive in Iraq for almost four months. The three aid workers from the Christian Peacemaker Teams – Canadians Harmeet Sooden, 32, and Jim Loney, 41, and Briton Norman Kember, 74 – were found together in a house in western Baghdad. They were bound, but the house was otherwise empty and not a shot was fired. The raid was put together in just three hours after US forces obtained information from a detainee about the location of the hostages, US-led coalition spokesman Major General Rick Lynch told reporters. Their US colleague Tom Fox, seized with them in Baghdad on November 26, was slain two weeks ago and his body found dumped in the city.

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Iraq

Troops in Iraq Free 3 Western Hostages

2006-03-23

Britain says multinational troops in Iraq have freed three Western peace activists held hostage since November. British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw announced in London that the hostages - Briton Norman Kember and Canadians James Loney and Harmeet Singh Sooden - were freed during a military operation Thursday. A fourth man seized at the same time, an American, was found shot to death in Baghdad earlier this month. Straw said today's rescue operation followed "weeks and weeks" of planning, but he released few details. He said the British hostage is now in Baghdad in "reasonable condition," but that the two Canadians are hospitalized. The three men, members of the Christian Peacemaker Teams, were abducted in Baghdad on November fourth, along with their American colleague, Tom Fox. A little known group, the Swords of Righteousness Brigades, claimed responsibility for the kidnapping. Separately, a suicide bombing at a security checkpoint in central Baghdad today killed at least 15 people and wounded more than 30 others. Most of the victims were policemen. Officials say the bomber rammed his explosives-laden vehicle into a checkpoint outside headquarters of the main criminal unit of the Iraqi police.

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Iraq

Video Of Peace Activist Hostages Aired

2006-03-07

Doha, 7 March. (AKI) - A videotape purporting to show three peace activists who were taken hostage in Iraq in November has been broadcast by Arab television station Al Jazeera. Briton Norman Kember, 74, who was seized in Baghdad with two Canadians and an American in November, appears on the tape which was broadcast without audio. The four captives - who belong to the group Christian Peacemaker - were last seen in a video clip dated 21 January, also aired by Al Jazeera. The tape broadcast on Monday showed the three men sitting in chairs and speaking, although there was no sound. It was not immediately clear which of the four hostages - James Loney, 41, and Harmeet Singh Sooden, 32, both from Canada, Tom Fox, 54, an American national, and Norman Kember from London - was not in the video. News reports say that one of those on the tape - believed to be Norman Kember - had white hair and a slight beard, while the two others had dark hair and full beards and all appeared in good health. The four were kidnapped in Baghdad more than three months ago, on 26 November. A previously unknown group - the Swords of Truth Brigade - claimed responsibility for the kidnapping and has on several occasions threatened to kill them unless all detainees in US and Iraqi prisons are released.

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Iraq

Five bodyguards killed as Iraq bank chief kidnapped

2006-02-18

One of the wealthiest bankers in Iraq has been kidnapped during an audacious raid that left his five bodyguards dead, murdered by single gunshots to the head in the garden of a rented villa in western Baghdad. Ghalib Abdul Hussein Kubba, the chairman of the al-Basra National Bank for Investment, was abducted with his son, Hassan, a senior employee at the bank, by up to a dozen gunmen. The kidnappers arrived at Mr Kubba’s house in the affluent Yarmouk district on Thursday evening in a minibus and two cars. They were dressed in the uniform of Iraqi National Guardsmen. “They set up a checkpoint and sealed off the street,” Mustafa al-Tahi, 20, a neighbour, said. “We just thought it was an official raid, because they had everything: uniform, weapons, even night-vision goggles on their helmets. They moved and spoke like soldiers. Only their vehicles were non-military. They turned cars away from the street, told drivers to switch off their headlamps and ordered people inside. “There was no gunfire. They left after a short time. There was silence for half an hour. No one knew what happened. Then came the sound of sirens. The police arrived. First they raided the wrong house, then they entered Kubba’s.” Inside they found Mr Kubba’s wife, his son’s wife and his two grandchildren huddled and sobbing in a corner. In the front garden of the high-walled, two-storey villa lay the bodies of his security detail. “They must have used silencers,” Corporal Mahmoud, a policeman, who lives nearby, said. “I was at home and didn’t hear a thing until I turned up on my shift and discovered what had happened — Kubba gone and five dead.” The kidnapping is the latest in a trend that is already the scourge of Iraq and has resulted in thousands of Iraqis and hundreds of foreigners being taken hostage since the American-led invasion in 2003. Mr Kubba joins a list that includes, at present, four Western peace activists — a Briton, Norman Kember, an American and two Canadians — Jill Carrol, an American journalist, and two German engineers. According to the US military, calls to the Iraqi Interior Ministry’s kidnap hotline have jumped from nine a week in mid-December to 26 a week last month, and a report published by the Brookings Institute, an American think-tank, estimates that there were 30 Iraqi kidnappings a day in December, up from ten a day the same month a year previously. The Iraqi Interior Ministry said that the numbers of those taken hostage include at least 425 foreign citizens and 5,000 Iraqis. The links between organised crime, terrorist and insurgent groups, tribal feuds and top-level corruption have made kidnapping something akin to a national industry. As Mr Kubba discovered, bodyguards are no guarantee of safety. Yarmouk, the affluent neighbourhood in western Baghdad from which Mr Kubba was seized, has been the scene of numerous abductions. Originally a leading figure in the southern city of Basra, Mr Kubba rose to financial prominence through canny banking deals and big-business ventures, facilitated by his strong relationship with leading Baathist figures in the regime of Saddam Hussein. People in Basra allege that he was a close friend of Uday Hussein, Saddam’s gangster son. Yet in 2003, after the regime fell, Mr Kubba was appointed head of Basra’s interim council by the British. He became the president of Basra commerce, headed many local businesses and was a leading figure in the city’s al-Fadilah Islamic party. One business associate described Mr Kubba as “a man with a black history — a different man for every day”. The list of suspects must be lengthy...

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Britain

UK Muslim rallies weren't exactly made up of moderates

2006-02-12

The Muslim campaigners behind a mass rally in Trafalgar Square today have close links to Islamic terror groups, the Daily Mail can reveal. Despite promoting itself as the 'moderate' voice of Islam, the Muslim Association of Britain includes a former military commander of Hamas, the Palestinian organisation behind dozens of suicide bombings in Israel. The Association has also been described in Parliament as the British wing of the Muslim Brotherhood, the banned Egyptian group whose former members include Osama Bin Laden. The revelations raise serious questions about support given by London Mayor Ken Livingstone to the rally, expected to attract 10,000 protesters against cartoons of Mohammed published in European newspapers. He hosted a press conference at his offices on Thursday to promote the demonstration as a chance to air the views of moderate Muslims. However, Labour MP Louise Ellman said the MAB was an 'extremist' group whose members repeatedly advocated suicide bombings in Israel. "They are an extremely dangerous organisation," she said. "Leading members of MAB have indicated their links with Hamas and their support for suicide bombings abroad. "It is not tenable for a group to support suicide bombings in another country while expecting to be seen as moderate in this country." Mike Whine, of the Community Security Trust, which monitors anti-Semitic behaviour, said: 'The leading members have close links with the Muslim Brotherhood and have been active in anti-Jewish propaganda. "We are worried about their increasing influence within the Muslim community." Azzam al-Tamimi - a Palestinian described yesterday by the MAB as one of its leading political thinkers - caused outrage 18 months ago when he told the BBC he would willingly carry out a suicide bombing in Israel. "Sacrificing myself for Palestine is a noble cause," he said. "It is the straight way to pleasing God and I would do it if I had the opportunity." In 2004, Dr Tamimi arranged for Egyptian preacher Yusuf al-Qaradawi to visit the UK despite his calls for homosexuals to be stoned to death and his suggestions that rape victims be punished if dressed "immodestly". Last year, five MAB members were made trustees of the re-opened Finsbury Park Mosque, North London, which was closed in 2003 because of the activities of its imam Abu Hamza. One trustee, Mohammed Kassem Sawalha, was named in a U.S. court case as a former senior Hamas commander responsible for terrorist activities in the West Bank in the 1990s. He is a former MAB president who admits he still supports Hamas. MAB leader Anas al-Tikriti is the son of Osama al-Tikriti, leader of the Muslim Brotherhood in Iraq. The organisation has strong historic links with Al Qaeda and other terror groups, including Islamic Jihad, which was behind the 1981 killing of Egyptian president Anwar Sadat. In the past, the MAB's website has encouraged followers to download images of the Star of David transformed into a swastika and has compared Israel to Nazi Germany. Internet watchdogs have reported the site to the Home Office for containing allegedly criminally racist material. The group has, however, repeatedly condemned calls for terror attacks on Britain and has tried to secure the release of British hostage Norman Kember in Iraq. It has also criticised the removal of Bibles from hospital bedsides as "political correctness gone mad". Yesterday Ihtisham Hibatullah, MAB's media director, accused Miss Ellman of 'inciting hatred towards the Muslim community' with her comments. "This kind of statement can only result in dividing communities and creating mistrust when the Association is working to build bridges and promote understanding and dialogue in our country," he said. Asked about the views of Dr Tamimi, Mr Hibatullah said: "He is one of our leading political thinkers and a leading member of the Association." Police have promised to take a harder line at today's rally after anger over their lack of action at a protest in London last week. Then, demonstrators held placards calling for the beheading of people who "insult Islam". Today, however, 'snatch squads' will be ready to arrest any troublemakers. MAB was founded in 1997 by Kamal el-Helbawy, who was at the time the European spokesman for the Muslim Brotherhood.

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