Terror cells regroup - and now their target is Europe
Secret intelligence papers from across the continent reveal a growing danger
from a widening network of fanatics - and this is a struggle the West cannot
lose
Antony Barnett, Jason Burke and Zoe Smith
Sunday January 11, 2004
The Observer
They had been watching him for months, aware that his pop star good looks
concealed a secret life as one of Europe's new terrorist kingpins. Finally, on
a cold winter dawn, the police moved in. Abderrazak Mahdjoub did not resist as
armed German officers surrounded his Hamburg home and led him away.
For at least a year, investigators claim, the 30-year-old Algerian had been a
key part of a network of Islamic militants dedicated to recruiting and
dispatching suicide bombers to the Middle East. Several volunteers had got
through, wreaking havoc in a series of attacks in Iraq. Many more were on their
way, along with bombers focused on targets in Europe.
Even worse, his associates were planning bombs in Western Europe. At least two
European intelligence services had made previous attempts to take Mahdjoub out.
Now, finally, it was the Germans' turn. This weekend, just over a month after
his arrest, Mahdjoub remains in prison at an undisclosed location. He is likely
to remain incarcerated for some time.
Mahdjoub's arrest was a minor victory in a major war being fought, bitterly and
secretly, in cities from London to Warsaw, from Madrid to Oslo. It pits the
best investigative officers in Europe against a fanatical network of men
dedicated to the prosecution of jihad both in Europe and overseas. It is a war
security officials know they cannot afford to lose - and that they know they
will be fighting for the foreseeable future.
Previously seen as a relative backwater in the war on terror, Europe is now in
the frontline. 'It's trench warfare,' said one security expert. 'We keep taking
them out. They keep coming at us. And every time they are coming at us harder.'
An investigation by The Observer has revealed the extent of the new networks
that Islamic militants have been able to build in Europe since 11 September -
despite the massive effort against them. The militants' operations go far
beyond the few individuals' activities that sparked massive security alerts
over Christmas and the new year. Interviews with senior counter-intelligence
officials, secret recordings of conversations between militants and classified
intelligence briefings have shown that militants have been able to
reconstitute, and even enlarge, their operations in Europe in the past two
years. The intelligence seen by The Observer reveals that:
· Britain is still playing a central logistical role for the militants, with
extremists, including the alleged mastermind of last year's bombings in
Morocco, and a leader of an al-Qaeda cell, regularly using the UK as a place to
hide. Other radical activists are using Britain for fundraising, massive credit
card fraud, the manufacture of false documents and planning. Recruitment is
also continuing. In one bugged conversation, a senior militant describes London
as 'the nerve centre' and says that his group has 'Albanians, Swiss [and]
British' recruits. He needs people who are 'intelligent and highly educated',
he says and implies that the UK can, and does, supply them.
· Islamic terror cells are spreading eastwards into Poland, Bulgaria, Romania
and the Czech Republic for the first time, prompting fears of a new
battleground in countries with weak authorities, powerful criminal gangs and
endemic corruption in the years to come.
· Austria has become a central communications hub for Muslim extremists; France
has become a key recruiting ground for fighters in Chechnya; and German groups,
who often have extensive international links, are developing contacts with
Balkan mafia gangs to acquire weapons.
The investigation has also revealed that, despite moves by the government there
to crack down, Saudi Arabia remains the key source of funds for al-Qaeda and
related militant groups.
Investigators stress that most of the European cells are autonomous, coming
together on an ad hoc basis to complete specific tasks. To describe them as
'al-Qaeda' is simplistic. Instead, sources say, the man most of these new
Islamic terror networks look to for direction is Abu Musab Zarqawi, a Jordanian
Islamic militant who some analysts believe was behind the recent Istanbul
suicide bombings against British targets and synagogues. Though he follows a
similar agenda to Osama bin Laden, the 37-year-old Zarqawi has always
maintained his independence from the Saudi-born fugitive. Last week, his
developing stature in global Islamic militancy was reinforced when he issued
his first-ever public statement, an audiotape calling on God to 'kill the Arab
and the foreign tyrants, one after another'.
Zarqawi is believed to be in Iran or Iraq. However European investigators have
discovered that one of his key lieutenants is an Iraqi Kurd known only as
Fouad, a cleric based in Syria, who handles the volunteer suicide bombers sent
from Europe to launch attacks in Iraq.
Italian investigators made the first breakthrough in the hunt for Zarqawi's
operatives. Just after 10pm on the evening of 15 June, 2002, an unidentified
Arab visitor from Germany - believed to be a senior figure in the militants'
network - arrived at a mosque in the Via Quaranta, Milan. He began by warning
the mosque's Egyptian imam, Abu Omar, about increased surveillance. He was
unaware that Italian police were listening to his every word.
Transcripts obtained by The Observer reveal that the visitor spoke of a project
needing 'intelligent and highly educated people'. Already, the visitor said,
that 'where the jihad part is concerned there was a battalion of 25 to 26
units'. It is these 'units', believed by investigators to mean potential
suicide bombers, that the authorities knew they had to find.
The visitor then began a review of recent developments. He stressed that 'the
thread begins in Saudi Arabia', where the bulk of funds apparently still comes
from. 'Don't ever worry about money, because Saudi Arabia's money is your
money,' the visitor says. He then refers to recent 'confidential' meetings in
Eastern Europe with Islamic militant leaders.
'Now Europe is controlled via air and land, but in Poland and Bulgaria and
countries that aren't part of the European Community everything is easy,' he
says. 'First of all they are corrupt, you can buy them with
dollars...[Secondly] they are less-controlled countries, there aren't too many
eyes.'
The man named Austria as a launch pad for attacks. 'The country from which
everything takes off is Austria. There I met all of the sheikhs and all our
brothers are there ... it has become the country of international
communications. It has become the country of contacts.'
Poland is a particularly important location too, the man says and names a
'Sheikh Abd al-Aziz', before boasting: 'His organisation is stunning.'
After translating the conversation, held in Arabic, Italian investigators
immediately relayed the information to counterparts elsewhere in Europe. The
British security services swung into action. The transcripts also reveal the
continuing importance of London.
'The nerve centre is still London,' the man says and hints that there are many
recruits from the UK: 'We have Albanians, Swiss [and] British.'
The role of the UK was reinforced when, last April, 29-year-old Somali-born
Cabdullah Ciise was arrested in Milan days after arriving from London, where he
had fled to escape Italian investigators months earlier. The Italians suspect
him of financing a terror cell involved in the car bomb attack on Israeli
tourists in Mombasa, Kenya in November 2002. According to Italian court
documents, Ciise transferred money from Great Britain to Somalia through Dubai.
He is also accused of being an important member of Zarqawi's international
terrorist organisation. A year earlier, in May 2002, Faraj Farj Hassan, the
suspected leader of an Islamic terrorist cell in Milan, was arrested in Harrow,
west London, where he had taken refuge with a relative who had political
asylum. Hassan, 23, was arrested for immigration offences and is believed to
still be held in Belmarsh high security prison awaiting extradition to Italy.
And last November, an Algerian-born British national from west London was
arrested after travelling to Poland. He was the subject of an Algerian arrest
warrant alleging his involvement in a terrorist group.
When the Italians arrested Ciise they put him in the same cell as another
Islamic radical known as 'Mera'i'. Again, the conversation was bugged; it gives
a chilling insight into the mind of a hardened militant.
Mera'i tells Ciise that he hates their jailers: 'They like life, I want to be a
martyr, I live for jihad. In this life there is nothing, life is afterward, the
indescribable sensation of dying a martyr.'
Then the pair talk about the Syrian-based cleric Fouad, whom they describe as
the 'gatekeeper' to Iraq. Other transcripts reveal conversations between Fouad
and Mera'i about how they had organised the flow of 'brothers' to Iraq via the
Syrian cities of Damascus and Aleppo. British suicide bombers who died in
Israel last year travelled through both cities. One of the network's recruits
is believed to have been involved in the rocket attack in October against the
Baghdad hotel where Paul Wolfowitz, the American deputy Secretary of Defence,
was staying. One phone call between the two reveals Mera'i telling Fouad that:
'This week more guests will be arriving ... they are good people.' Fouad
replies: 'I want those that are awake and prepared ... I want those who will
strike the earth and make iron rise out of it ... I'm looking for those that
were in Japan [ie, kamikaze or suicide bombers].'
The Italian investigation yielded important intelligence and the focus shifted
to Germany. After 11 September, authorities there had concentrated on rounding
up all those connected with the 'Hamburg cell' who had led the attacks on New
York and Washington. Soon, however, they came across a group known as
'al-Tauhid' (the unitarians) which posed as grave a threat. Al-Tauhid were
loyal to Zarqawi; indeed, many of their key personnel had trained in his camp
in Afghanistan in the late 1990s.
According to an intelligence dossier compiled last year by German criminal
intelligence, the link between the Italian network and the German cells was a
30-year-old Palestinian called Mansour Thaer. Another connection was a Turk
called Mevluet Tar, a 23-year-old who spoke fluent German. Both were quickly
picked up.
The dossier lists a dozen senior al-Tauhid operatives in Germany. Most were
involved in the provision of false passports or spent their time raising and
transferring funds to fighters in the Middle East. But others, many still at
large, were involved in plotting bomb attacks against Jewish targets in Western
Europe. At least one militant liaised with Albanian mafia gangs in a bid to
obtain weapons, the dossier reveals. Only a handful of the individuals named in
the document have been arrested.
Last week there were more arrests. In Paris a group alleged to be recruiting
fighters for the war in Chechnya was picked up. In Switzerland a series of
raids broke up an alleged support and fundraising network which had connections
to the men who set off bombs in Riyadh last May. In Spain, a favoured entry
point into Europe for North African militants, investigators continue to chase
down terrorists linked to cells rounded up earlier.
A Moroccan cleric called Mohammed al-Garbuzi, whom local authorities claim was
a key figure in the Casablanca bombings last May, is believed to be at large in
the UK. Scotland Yard last week warned leaders of the Jewish community that the
threat 'remained high'. Senior British police officers said they are aware that
millions of pounds are being raised in the UK by credit card fraud for Islamic
militant groups.
'We act when we can,' said one police source. 'But we are stretched enough
going after the clear and immediate threats, let alone their back-up.'
Security experts stress that the campaign to prevent another major bomb attack
in Western Europe has got no easier since major round-ups after 11 September.
'We are dealing with something that is organic, not mechanical,' one told The
Observer . 'You can't remove a part and watch it all break down. It's more like
fungus. Burn some away and it just keeps growing somewhere else.'
The targets, the death toll and the suspects
Istanbul November 2003, 62 dead
Target: British consulate and bank, synagogues
Suspect: Local Islamic group thought to be linked to al-Qaeda or Abu Musab
Zarqawi
Baghdad August-October 2003, 50 dead
Target: Al-Rasheed hotel, UN and Red Cross headquarters.
Suspect: European suicide bombers believed to have been recruited by Mullah
Fouad in Syria.
Casablanca May 2003, 41 dead
Target: Jewish community centre and Spanish social club
Suspect: Local Islamic group. The authorities want to interview a Moroccan
cleric, Mohammed al-Garbuzi, who is believed to be in Britain.
Riyadh May 2003, 34 dead
Target: Luxury compounds in Saudi capital
Suspect: Swiss arrest an eight-strong 'logistics cell'.
Mombasa November 2002, 16 dead
Target: Israeli tourists at Paradise hotel
Suspect: Kenyan Islamic cell. Some funds allegedly provided by a Somali-born
militant living in London, arrested in Milan and 'a part of Zarqawi's cell'.
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