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7 held in Denmark after anti-terror sting

2006-09-06

Follow-up on yesterday's story. EFL. ODENSE, Denmark - Seven men faced preliminary charges of plotting a terror attack in Denmark on Tuesday, while two others arrested in pre-dawn raids were released. Investigators said they launched the pre-emptive raids early Tuesday after having the group under surveillance for some time, though they said they were not sure what stage of planning the suspects were in. The clues police found indicate that they were very likely planning an attack somewhere in Denmark,’ Justice Minister Lene Espersen told The Associated Press. It was the most serious matter I have had in my time as justice minister,’ she said. Police went in and stopped the group as it was preparing an attack.’ Officials said the nine suspects arrested were Danish citizens between the ages of 18 and 33. Findsen said eight had immigrant backgrounds, but did not specify from what countries. Two of them were released later Tuesday, but the other seven arrived for a closed court hearing in Odense, handcuffed with plastic strips that were removed upon the request of the defense lawyers. Prosecutor Erik Terp Jensen demanded that they be held in custody on preliminary charges of plotting terror acts as the investigation continues. The maximum sentence is life in prison, although such sentences are commuted after 16 years under Danish laws. So they get a second chance to commit a terrorist act. Witnesses said several more people were rounded up in the raids, but released after police checked their identities. Investigators did not reveal the planned target of the attack, and said it was hard to evaluate how far the suspects had progressed in their preparations. With the general terror situation, the Danish Security Intelligence Service didn’t want to run any unnecessary risk,’ Findsen said. The Danes generally are a sensible people. He said the sweep was not related to a terror investigation in Germany in which four Lebanese suspects are being held in connection with a failed train bombing attempt. German media claimed one of the suspects, Youssef Mohamad el Hajdib, who was arrested Aug. 19 in the northern German city of Kiel, was heading to Denmark. German and Danish media reported that German police had found a telephone number in his pocket for Abu Bashar, an imam living in Odense. Abu Bashar denied knowing el Hajdib, but said it was a matter of time before terrorists would strike Denmark. "Youse guys are gonna get it by Allan!" 'Osama Bin Laden said in a message three years ago that he will punish the countries that have (troops) in Iraq,’ he told the AP. 'Denmark is on the list. I am afraid of the message of Osama Bin Laden that he will do something against Denmark.’ Abu Bashar said he knew the suspects arrested Tuesday as members of Odense’s Muslim community, and predicted they would be found innocent. I believe that very, very soon they will be released,’ he said. And deported along with your fat ass. How's Mauritania sound?

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Europe

Danish Police Arrest 9 Terror Suspects

2006-09-05

Police in Denmark on Tuesday arrested nine people suspected of plotting a terror attack with materials they acquired to build explosives, intelligence officials said. Justice Minister Lene Espersen called the case "very serious," and said the group had been under surveillance for some time. "It is among the worst that has happened in Denmark," she told the TV2 channel, without providing any details. Lars Findsen, head of the Danish Security Intelligence Service, said the suspects had acquired materials to build explosives "in connection with the preparation of a terror act," without elaborating. He did not reveal the planned target of the attack and said it was hard to evaluate how far the plot had come along. "With the general terror situation, the Danish Security Intelligence Service didn't want to run any unnecessary risk," Findsen said. He said the suspects _ one ethnic Dane and eight people with immigrant backgrounds, all between the ages of 18 and 33 _ would face a custody hearing later Tuesday in Odense, 100 miles west of Copenhagen. Espersen said all nine were Danish citizens. The suspects were arrested early Tuesday in Vollsmose, a mostly immigrant suburb west of Odense, Denmark's third-largest city. The sweep came nearly two weeks after four young Muslims were charged in Copenhagen in connection with a Bosnian terror probe. Investigators said the network planned to blow up a target in a European country to force the withdrawal of foreign troops from Afghanistan and Iraq. The four men, who have not been identified, were charged with helping to provide weapons and explosives to two men arrested in Bosnia. The four have denied any wrongdoing. Police did not say if the new arrests were related to that case. Findsen said, however, the arrests were not related to a terror investigation in Germany in which four Lebanese suspects are being held in connection with a failed train bombing attempt. German media claimed one of the suspects, Youssef Mohamad el Hajdib, who was arrested Aug. 19 in the northern German city of Kiel, was heading to Denmark. German and Danish media reported German police found a telephone number in his pockets for Abu Bashar, an imam living in Odense. Abu Bashar has denied knowing el Hajdib but told newspaper Fyens Stifitstidende that it was a matter of time before terrorists would strike Denmark. "I fear a terror attack in Denmark because there are Danish troops in Iraq," he was quoted as saying.

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Europe

Prophet drawings motivated by suspects behind failed German train bombings

2006-09-03

BERLIN The prime suspects in the failed attempt to blow up two German trains were partially motivated by anger over the publication of cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad, a leading investigator said in an interview released Saturday. The Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten first published the 12 cartoons in September 2005. One of the pictures showed Muhammad wearing a turban shaped like a bomb. Some of the caricatures were republished in German newspapers and other European media months later, sparking protests across the Muslim world, with rioters torching Danish and other Western embassies. Train bombing suspect Jihad Hamad, 20, told interrogators in Lebanon that fellow Lebanese student Youssef Mohamad el Hajdib, 21, "interpreted it as an attack of the Western world on Islam," said Joerg Ziercke, head of Germany's Federal Crime Office, or BKA. El Hajdib was arrested Aug. 19 in the northern German city of Kiel, and Hamad was picked up a few days later in Lebanon. The men are suspected of planting crude bombs July 31 on two trains at Cologne station, where they were seen in grainy surveillance camera video pulling wheeled suitcases. The bombs were found later in the day on regional trains in Koblenz and Dortmund. Authorities have said that the detonators went off but failed to ignite the devices. Ziercke told Focus magazine that further motivation for the suspects came with the death of al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, killed June 7 in a U.S. airstrike north of Baghdad. "Both of the prime suspects believed that international terrorism had lost its most important leader," Ziercke said in an interview released to The Associated Press ahead of publication. "The conflict in Lebanon also played a role (in motivating them) though we know the planning for the attacks had already begun earlier than that." The BKA confirmed the content of the interview. In addition to Hamad, Lebanese authorities have arrested three other men in connection with the case: Ayman Hawa, Khaled Khair-Eddin el-Hajdib, Khalil al-Boubou. They were rounded up by police acting on information from Interpol. German officials have also taken a 23-year-old Syrian, Fadi al-Saleh, into custody in the southern city of Konstanz on suspicion he did Internet research in preparing the bombings. Lebanese prosecutor Pierre Francis on Saturday charged all six suspects in the case, a development that appeared to signal that Beirut would refuse to extradite to Germany the four men held in Lebanon. The charges came as a security team headed by German intelligence chief Ernst Uhrlau, was in Beirut meeting with Lebanese army intelligence and security chiefs. Uhrlau arrived under tight security Friday in what Lebanese newspapers said was a mission to seek the extradition of the men. Ziercke said he did not believe Hamad and el-Hajdib came to Germany with the intent to prepare attacks. "The radicalization first took place here, through al-Qaida propaganda found on the Internet," he said. The bomb plans were also found on the Internet, and the devices would have cost a total of about €200 (US$250) to €300 (US$385) to build, he said. "We found instructions that account for about 90 percent of their bombs," he said. "They diverged from the plans only in a couple points — and it was here that the technical mistakes were made." But Ziercke rejected suggestions that the sloppy construction of the bombs and other clues — DNA, fingerprints and the use of their own passports in travel — meant they were untrained amateurs. "To the contrary: They had counted on their plan working," he said. "Then the crucial clues would have been obliterated. We, for example, would never have found any suitcases that we could match to people seen on video surveillance."

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Europe

Two more arrests made in connection with German train bombings

2006-08-26

German police arrested a third suspect today in connection with a failed attempt to blow up two trains, and Lebanese authorities picked up a fourth man as the investigation gathered steam, officials said. The man arrested in Germany, whose identity was not released, was detained in the southern city of Konstanz on suspicion of membership in a terrorist organisation, attempting to set off an explosion and multiple counts of attempted murder. “The man ... was detained in the southern city of Konstanz on suspicion of membership in a terrorist organisation, attempting to set off an explosion and multiple counts of attempted murder...” Prosecutors said he was an associate of Youssef Mohamad el Hajdib, a Lebanese man accused of planting the bombs along with his compatriot Jihad Hamad on July 31. “Whether, and to what extent he was involved in preparing the attacks is the subject of the investigation,” said Frauke Scheuten, spokeswoman for the federal prosecutor’s office. After a nearly three-week lull following the attempted bombings, the case has moved quickly over recent days. El Hajdib was arrested on August 19, and Hamad was arrested in Lebanon yesterday. Lebanese Prosecutor-General Saeed Mirza said it was information from Hamad’s interrogation that led to the arrest of the fourth suspect, whose identity he gave only as 24-year-old H.K.D. The man is from the village of Sindianeh in the northern Lebanese province of Akkar, Hamad’s home province. El Hajdib, 21, was a student who lived in the northern German city of Kiel, while Hamad, 20, lived in Cologne. The two are accused of planting the bombs at the Cologne train station. The detonators for the devices went off, but the bombs failed to explode and were discovered on regional trains in Koblenz and Dortmund.

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Europe

Hamburg Becomes Focus in Failed Terror Plot

2006-08-23

A Lebanese student suspected of a failed attempt to blow up a German train had contacts in Hamburg, authorities said Tuesday, drawing attention back to the northern port city where three of the Sept. 11 homicide pilots prepared for their attacks on the U.S. Nearly five years since the attacks on New York and Washington, the case has provided shocking proof for many that Germany is now also a terrorist target. “ZDF television showed police leading away one man in handcuffs after one of the raids, and said a second had also been detained...” The main suspect, identified by authorities as 21-year-old Youssef Mohamad el Hajdib, was arrested Saturday in Kiel, about 30 miles north of Hamburg, on suspicion of placing one of two suitcase bombs in German trains on July 31. On Tuesday, federal prosecutors said they had identified the second main suspect, while police searched his Cologne apartment as well as addresses in Kiel and Oberhausen. ZDF television showed police leading away one man in handcuffs after one of the raids, and said a second had also been detained. However, prosecutors said the second suspected bomber, whose name they did not release, remains at large. The Sueddeutsche Zeitung newspaper, citing unidentified investigators, said the fugitive was also a Lebanese national and was believed to have fled Germany.

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