The Sana'a Counter-Terrorism court will commence trying 13 people next week who are suspected of links to Al-Qaeda and accused of plotting terrorist attacks, a legal source said on Monday. The new group of suspected terrorists will also be prosecuted on other charges, never before made against Al-Qaeda network members, including some linked to immoral activities. Meanwhile the same court continued Monday the tribunal of 11 other Al-Qaeda suspects accused of planning to form an armed gang to carry out "criminal acts" in Yemen and abroad as well as trying to join militants battling U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.The list includes: Mohammed Saleh al-Kazmi, 35, Abdullah Yahya al-Wadaee, 27, Mansur Nasser al-Bihani, 31, Shafeeq Ahmed Omar, 26, Ibrahim Mohammed al-Mukri, 43, Mohammed Ahmed Hatem, 30 - all of who were born in Saudi Arabia -and Saddam Hussein Ismail, 24, Fares Mohammed Ali, 27, Abdul Raoof Abdullah Naseeb, 30 and Ahmed Mohammed al-Kardai, 27, and Ismail al-Husami.
The court judge questioned the defendant Fares al-Nahdi, 35, who denied charges of the prosecution. Yet, he said he took 12 Saudi passports which Khaled Faaq asked him to give them to Amer al-Nahdi. He claimed the passports were not forged as the prosecutor said. He also admitted that he took 120,000 Saudi riyals which was collected in his region of Saudi Arabia for the Iraqi people after the US war. He said he was given the money by someone called Bakr al-Rabian and his role was to hand over to an Iraqi citizen called Yahia. He said he was tried in Saudi Arabia and served eight months in jail plus 80 beatings. However, the prosecutor said that he got a letter from the chief of intelligence and that there are documents proving that four of the suspects were tried in Saudi Arabia but not copies of the verdicts. He said Al-Nahdi was not included in this group who were tried in Saudi Arabia. The court adjourned the case after dealing with procedural questions and fixed its next hearing for Feb. 28. It ordered that the two advocates appointed to defend the defendants should be given access to the case file.