MADRID - Once known as a wealthy trader in his Madrid neighbourhood, Imad Eddin Barakat Yarkas, alias ' Abu Dahdah ', is accused of being Al-Qaeda's leader in Spain and of links to the 9/11 attacks. The Syrian-born Yarkas, 41, who went on trial in Madrid on Friday, was arrested in the days following the September 2001 suicide attacks on the United States, suspected of helping to plot the killings. Authorities also believe he played a key role in establishing the extremist Islamic networks later blamed for the 11 March 11, 2004 train bombings in Madrid, which killed 191 people and injured almost 2,000.
Until his arrest, Yarkas seemingly led an orderly life between his business activities, his involvement with the local mosque, and his marriage to a Spaniard converted to Islam. He was a well-known figure in the capital's popular Lavapies neighbourhood, although he also made regular trips abroad. He stands accused of recruiting young Islamic militants for Osama bin Laden's Al-Qaeda network between 1995 and 2001 and of sending at least 12 of them for training in Afghanistan, or to fight in Bosnia, Chechnya or Indonesia. Yarkas repeatedly claimed his innocence during preliminary hearings led by the Spanish anti-terrorist judge Baltasar Garzon, and is expected to plead 'not guilty' at his high-security trial, which opened in the Spanish capital.
Twenty-four suspected Al-Qaeda members appeared in court inside a bullet-proof glass cubicle, three of them (including Yarkas) accused of links to the 9/11 strikes. Prosecutors are calling for the three to face 60,000 years imprisonment for their alleged role in the attacks - 25 years for each life lost. A stocky man with thinning hair, Yarkas sat in the back row of the defendants' box, smiling and greeting his co-accused. He is not expected to face questioning until early next week. Telephone taps, police tails and other evidence allegedly link Yarkas to suspected top members of the Al-Qaeda network and specifically to several of the 9/11 suicide attackers. His Madrid telephone number was found at the Hamburg home of an Al-Qaeda member involved in the attacks. With the help of Driss Chebli, also on trial in Madrid, he allegedly organised a meeting where plans for the suicide attacks were finalised, in the Spanish coastal city of Tarragona in July 2001. Spanish authorities are still searching for several of Yarkas's associates, including his former right-hand-man, Amer Aziz, who is believed to have been linked to the Madrid bombings. |