UK: Eight men face terror charges

[emad]

BBC News snip

Police have charged eight men with terror offences, including conspiracy to murder. Under the Terrorism Act police had a deadline of Tuesday afternoon to charge them or release them, having questioned them for a fortnight.

All eight will appear in Bow Street Magistrates' Court on Wednesday, Scotland Yard said on Tuesday.

A ninth man arrested with them on 3 August was charged with possession of a prohibited weapon.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3573680.stm

[AP]

1. I hear they're Freemasons.

:)

[gandalf]

5. No, they are Templars,

pursuing The Great Plan.

[emad]

7. P2 Lodge, 21st century-style...

?

[gandalf]

8. OK, I forgot about these P2 guys...

but as I just read in Eco's "Foucault's Pendulum", the freemasons are a degenerated version of the Templars...

[emad]

13. I think freemasons go back to days of ancient Egypt where the

Cult of the Snake was the no 1 covert society and in charge of all Pharaonic building works...
Templars were the first Roberto Calvis - they escorted pilgrims to Holy Land and acted as bankers to the European monarchs.
P2 Lodge is a paedophile masonic offshoot of the Freemasons. "The Broken Cross" by Piers Compton and "In God's Name" by David Yallop are good source of reference about this.

[gandalf]

14. Thanks for the hints!

[emad]

2. Addendum: plans included NY Stock Exchange, IMF in DC....

The eight were named as Dhiren Barot; Mohammed Naveed Bhatti, 24, from Harrow, Middlesex; Abdul Aziz Jalil, 31, from Luton, Bedfordshire; Omar Abdul Rehman, 20 from Bushey, Hertfordshire; Junade Feroze, 28, from Blackburn, Lancashire; Zia Ul Haq, 25, from Paddington, London; Qaisar Shaffi; and Nadeem Tarmohammed.

Police charged them of conspiring "together and with other persons unknown" between 1 January 2000 and 4 August 2004 under the Criminal Law Act 1977. Under the Terrorism Act police had a deadline of Tuesday afternoon to charge them or release them, having questioned them for a fortnight. Three of the nine were also charged under the Terrorism Act 2000.

Mr Barot, 32 and from Willesden, London, was also charged with possessing reconnaissance plans of the Stock Exchange in New York, the IMF in Washington, and the Citigroup in New York and having notebooks with information on explosives, poisons, chemicals and related matters.

He was also charged with possessing a reconnaissance plan of the Prudential Building in New Jersey, U.S, as was Mr Tarmohammed, 26 and also of Willesden. The plans contained "information of a kind likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism contrary to Section 58 of the Terrorism Act 2000," police said. Mr Shaffi, 25, from Willesden, was charged with having an extract of the Terrorist's Handbook, Scotland Yard said. It was unclear which court the ninth man, Matthew Monks, 32, of Sudbury, would appear in and a date for his court appearance has not been set.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3573680.stm

[gandalf]

6. Terrorist handbook

If I wanted to be sure to be identified as a terrorist in case of my arrest, I would make sure to have a Koran and a terrorist handbook either printed out or not encrypted on my computer, as well as instructions for building bombs and plans of the London subway.

Silly things like powerful disk or file encryption is only for cowards, real terrorists don't use them.

[emad]

3. Addendum 2: Terror police accused of abuse (Guardian)

Vikram Dodd and Tania Branigan
Tuesday August 17, 2004
The Guardian

Snip

Terrorism suspects who must be charged or released today after two weeks of questioning have been psychologically abused by police, their solicitor has claimed.

The men were arrested in a series of high-profile raids by M15 and anti-terrorism officers and have been held at the top-security Paddington Green police station in London.

Mudassar Arani, a solicitor for seven of the nine Muslim men, accused the police of keeping them in solitary confinement for 12 days, and stopping three of the suspects from reading the Qur'an by removing their spectacles.

Her criticism came as concern rises in the Muslim community about the handling of anti-terrorism operations.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/terrorism/story/0,12780,1284659,00.html

[emad]

4. Addendum 3: "Murder and radioactive chemical attacks on US"

London Evening Standard snip

Eight face terror charges
17 August 2004

Eight men arrested in anti-terror raids have been charged with conspiring to commit murder and launch radioactive or chemical attacks.

A second charge alleges that between the same dates they plotted to use "radioactive materials, toxic gases, chemicals and explosives".

More:
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/articles/12621022?source=PA

[Snazzy]

9. Reuters broke and has been following the Khan outing angle

Which I suppose, thanks to a little help from Charley, is down the memory hole here (maybe Shummer will follow-up).

Reuters:

Britain Charges 8 in Plot Linked to U.S. Alert

(skipping same basic info)

...

As has repeatedly been the case over the past several weeks, senior U.S. officials had more to say about the anti-terrorism developments in London than their British counterparts.

... (snip Asscroft statement)

Britain has arrested more than 600 terrorism suspects since the Sept. 11 attacks but has charged fewer than 100 and convicted only 15 of terrorism offences.

The raids two weeks ago -- carried out in evident haste after the U.S. alert, with some suspects pulled from shops and others held in a car chase -- had a more urgent tone than previous anti-terrorism swoops.

They followed the arrest of 25-year-old al Qaeda computer expert Mohammed Naeem Noor Khan, captured in secret on July 13 in the Pakistani city of Lahore.

Pakistani intelligence sources have said Khan cooperated under cover, helping authorities track down al Qaeda contacts abroad. But that sting operation ended when Khan's name appeared in U.S. newspapers the morning after Washington announced its alert. Britain swooped on its suspects the next day.

....

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=5998092&pageNumber=0

[Snazzy]

10. AP has a little more on Khan today

Pakistan Father Challenges Son's Detention

MUNIR AHMAD

Associated Press


ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - The father of an alleged al-Qaida computer expert Tuesday filed a lawsuit in a Pakistani court challenging what he called the illegal detention of his son, who was captured last month, a defense lawyer said.

Mohammed Naeem Noor Khan was captured by Pakistani intelligence agents July 13 during a raid in the eastern city of Lahore, and a search of his computers uncovered surveillance documents of five financial institutions in the United States, prompting a terror alert in three U.S. cities this month.

...

On Tuesday, Babar Awan, a defense lawyer, told AP that Khan's father has filed a lawsuit in a court at Rawalpindi, a garrison city near the capital, Islamabad, "against illegal detention of his son."

"Whatever the allegation against the boy may be, he has a right to be defended through a counsel of his own choice," Awan said.

(snip family ot informed of his detention)

....

http://www.macon.com/mld/macon/news/world/9423924.htm

[Snazzy]

11. NYT today too--a round up story

TERROR ALERT
New Cooperation and New Tensions in Terrorist Hunt
By AMY WALDMAN and ERIC LIPTON

Published: August 17, 2004


ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Aug. 16 - Muhammad Naeem Noor Khan walked into the Lahore International Airport on the morning of July 13, in search of a package that had been sent to him by his father in Karachi, some 600 miles away.

But something other than his package was awaiting him. A group of Pakistani security officers detained Mr. Khan, a tall, heavy-set 25-year-old computer engineer, on suspicions that he was the same elusive operative for Al Qaeda whom United States intelligence sources had tipped them off to two months earlier.

The apprehension of Mr. Khan, in this ancient Punjab city not far from the Indian border, was wrapped up with almost no notice; his arrest did not even make the local papers. But before the end of the month, that single act would have enormous global repercussions.

....

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/17/international/asia/17terror.html?pagewanted=all&position=

(although eventually they make the point of Khan's name being released, by them, the NYT from the admin., may have compromised an op, it is predictably softballed.)

Exception being the last 2 para quoting a brit official:

"I could have appeared a dozen times last week on radio and television, but I turned down the offers," he wrote in a commentary piece published in The Observer in Britain. "I would have merely added to the speculation, to the hype, to the desire for something to say for its own sake. In other words, to feed the news frenzy in a slack news period.

"Is that really the job of a senior cabinet minister in charge of counterterrorism? To feed the media? To increase concern? To have something to say, whatever it is, in order to satisfy the insatiable desire to hear somebody saying something? Of course not. This is arrant nonsense."

[Snazzy]

12. JMM has comentary and links in two excel. articles today

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2004_08_15.php#003279

WaPo:

Don't Politicize Terrorism

By David Ignatius
Tuesday, August 17, 2004; Page A15

The mixing of anti-terrorism policy with the 2004 presidential campaign is becoming destructive. It is creating a vicious cycle of hype, skepticism and mistrust that puts the country's security at risk.

The dangers of politicizing terrorism were clear in this month's announcement about potential attacks on financial centers in the New York area and in Washington. When Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge disclosed the threats on Aug. 1, he faced immediate skepticism about whether the intelligence was valid. Sadly, the Bush administration had helped create this climate of public suspicion by overusing its elaborate, color-coded system of terrorism warnings. After a terrorism advisory by Attorney General John Ashcroft last spring was pooh-poohed the same day by Ridge, some people wondered whether these warnings were being used for political effect.

...

According to a Post report attributed to a senior U.S. official, "Khan became part of a sting operation organized by the CIA after he was captured last month and agreed to send coded e-mail messages to al Qaeda contacts around the world." That sting operation was blown instantly by the leak of Khan's name.

This isn't a normal leak case; the stakes here are life and death. From what we know, it appears that Khan may, all too briefly, have been one of the most important agents in place the United States has managed to recruit in al Qaeda. Had he been able to continue e-mailing members of al Qaeda, security agencies could have rolled up many more members of the network. But once Khan's name was in the paper Aug. 2, any chance of exploiting him further was gone.

....

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A6679-2004Aug16.html


Salon:

Subcontracting the hunt for bin Laden
The twisted relationship between the Bush administration and Pakistan's military regime, driven by a mutual desire for survival, is undermining the war on terror.

- - - - - - - - - - - -
By Husain Haqqani

Aug. 17, 2004 | The day after Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge announced a new orange alert, the New York Times reported that the information leading to the alert came from the arrest in Lahore, Pakistan, three weeks earlier of Mohammed Naeem Noor Khan, a computer wizard linked to al-Qaida. It was later revealed that since his arrest Khan had been working as a double agent for the Pakistanis and the Americans, passing on al-Qaida leaders' messages to its operatives and helping uncover members of the global terrorist network. Khan's identification in the New York Times ended his usefulness in ferreting out terrorists -- a tragic loss in the war on terror.

Reporters initially fingered American officials for leaking Khan's name. National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice all but acknowledged the administration's mistake in an interview with CNN's Wolf Blitzer. The matter was then written off as another blunder caused by the fog of war.


But in fact, U.S. officials did not leak Khan's name. The first leak of Khan's name, according to well-informed, reliable sources in the region who spoke on condition of anonymity, came from Pakistani officials in Islamabad -- who perhaps were motivated by eagerness to show off their success in arresting al-Qaida figures or, more ominously, by a desire to sabotage the penetration of al-Qaida that Khan's arrest had made possible. A second Pakistani leak to Reuters, blaming the Americans as the source of the leak, served to absolve the Pakistanis of any responsibility in breaking up new al-Qaida cells -- an important move domestically.

....


http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2004/08/17/pakistan_terrorism/index.html

[Snazzy]

15. Juan Cole has Informed Comments about Khan today

http://www.juancole.com/2004_08_01_juancole_archive.html#109280908668332369

One minor thing about the transcript he talks about--it may be sneakily redacted:

Question: So you're saying you have not identified specific individuals involved in these (inaudible)?

Senior Intelligence Official: At this point, as you can imagine, this is on-going intelligence case as well as law enforcement investigative case, and so what might be happening as we speak about specifics and specific individuals or whatever is something that we will not address.

Question: (inaudible) come from the arrests Gadlani and as far as this (inaudible) talk about here today, did you have information on (inaudible) what you found in his pocket or his possessions?

Senior Intelligence Official: As I said, I think I would prefer not to discuss a specific source of information except to say that it was acquired pretty recently.

Question: And how significant (inaudible)?

Senior Intelligence Official: I've leave (inaudible).

Question: (inaudible) you mentioned documents (inaudible) you saying you recently acquired additional documents related to this (inaudible)?

All those inaudibles could disguise a wealth of sins.

http://www.dhs.gov/dhspublic/display?content=3872