MADRID- A Syrian and an Egyptian suspected of having links with the group that carried out the deadly Madrid train bomb attacks in March have been arrested in Spain, the interior ministry announced. The ministry named the pair as 29-year-old Syrian Adman Waki and Ahmed Ibrahim Kassem, a 28-year-old Egyptian. News reports had earlier mistakenly identified Kassem as being Algerian. | Easy mistake to make, they're both North Africans, right? |
According to a report by the Spanish daily El Pais, investigators regard Waki as a key suspect and say he may have used one of the mobile phones also used by Serhane Ben Abdelmajid Fakhet, a Tunisian suspected of having had a key-role in the Madrid bombings. | This is getting as bad as the Cole bombing. Is there anyone in Spain who isn't a "key" suspect? |
Fakhet, known as "The Tunisian", and six other members of the group blew themselves up during a police raid in the suburbs of Madrid in April following the attacks, in which 191 people died and 1,900 were wounded in the worst ever terrorist strike on Spain. Waki has been under police surveillance for several months by Spanish secret service agents, according to El Pais. He has allegedly made several trips abroad, notably within Europe, during which he apparently raised funds for an Islamic terrorist network. Working as a mason he was based in Irun, in the north-eastern Basque region of the country, where the arrests were made. Kassem, detained alongside Waki, also lives in the Basque region, El Pais said, without giving further details. | But the Basques were not involved in any way, the Socialists said so. |
In a further development this week regarding the 11 March blasts another key suspect, Rabei Ousmane Sayed Ahmed, was Wednesday remanded in custody and sent to a jail on the outskirts of Madrid after Italian officials handed him over Tuesday night. Spain wants to try Ahmed, nicknamed Mohammed the Egyptian, whom Italian authorities arrested on June 8 in Milan, on charges of multiple homicide and possession of explosives. In the first trial relating to the attacks, a Spanish national aged 16 was convicted last month for his involvement in the bombings. Nineteen suspects are now being detained in Spain over the atrocity. |