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| Europe |
| Witnesses at Trial in Germany Implicate Mottasadeq in 9/11 Plot |
| 2004-09-07 |
| From Front Page, an article by Stephen Brown Mournir el Mottasadeq, 30, a native of Morocco, ... is once again facing charges of accessory to murder in more than 3,000 cases and of membership in a terrorist organization. The Moroccan immigrant, who signed Atta's will, was a member of the infamous al Qaeda Hamburg cell of 9/11 death pilots Mohammed Atta, Marwan al-Shehhi and Ziad Jarrah. The accused Muslim was first tried and convicted on these same charges in August, 2002, receiving a 15-year sentence ... However, the guilty verdict was tossed out on appeal last March ... The appeal court judge ... ordered a retrial that started August 10. ... Ramsi Binalshibh also explained away Motassadeq's power of attorney over suicide pilot Alshehhi's bank account by saying the Moroccan did not know what the money he was distributing was for. The Moroccan Islamist [Mottasadeq], who trained at an al-Qaeda camp in Afghanistan, had also met Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in Pakistan. But the chief planner of 9/11 [Binalshibh] said in his American-provided statements that they never talked about the upcoming terrorist attack, but rather about a trip to Afghanistan. .... The prosecution in the trial, however, contends the documents lack credibility. Calling Motassadeq the Hamburg 9/11 group's "Statthalter" (governor), it believes he paid bills and provided other assistance, so that cell members could outwardly pose as students while planning the attack. .... Moreover, Binalshibh's statements say that only he and the actual 9/11 assailants knew about the terrorists' flight training in the United States. But in a surprise revelation, a witness at the trial said he met by chance in Hamburg at the start of 2000 a member of the cell, Said Bahaji, who told him Atta was in the United States, learning to fly. The witness, a 32-year-old Turk, said he was astounded because he knew Atta was studying city planning. This brings up the question concerning what Motassadeq, who has always denied any knowledge of Atta's stay in America, actually knew. If Bahaji possessed this information, the prosecution reasons, then why wouldn't Atta's close friend Motassadeq? Bahaji, needless to say, went underground shortly before 9/11 and hasn't been seen since. |
| Posted by:Mike Sylwester |
| #1 Trains at an AQ camp in Afghanistan, signs Atta's will, pays bills. "I didn't know nothing about nobody" defense. And case is tossed out because Amreekis don't want to divulge sources. Lovely. OK, German justice. Let's get it right the second time, please, or, just like the linked article said, you're going to become a haven. |
| Posted by: chicago mike 2004-09-07 10:40:42 AM |