| Submit your comments on this article |
| Europe |
| FBI links Madrid bombs to 911 |
| 2004-11-28 |
| THE US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has established the clearest link yet between the March 11 Madrid train bombings and the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States, a Spanish newspaper reported today. The FBI has told Spanish investigators that one of three men believed to have planned the September 11 attacks from Spain in the summer of 2001 also gave the order to carry out the Madrid blasts, ABC reported. The train bombings killed 191 people and wounded 1900 three days before a general election. In videotapes, the bombers claimed the attacks in the name of al-Qaeda in Europe and said they were in revenge for Spain sending troops to Iraq and Afghanistan. Investigators have long concluded that the September 11 attacks were partially planned in Spain in July 2001. Hijacker Mohammed Atta, believed to have piloted one of the airliners that crashed into New York's World Trade Center, visited Spain two months before the attacks and met two men. One was Ramzi bin al-Shaibah, who is being held by US authorities, while the other was unidentified. ABC said investigators now believe that third man was the one who in December 2003 activated the al-Qaeda cell that carried out the March 11 attacks, which Spaniards call "our September 11". ABC said investigators had narrowed his identity down to three candidates and believed he was a lieutenant of Mustafa Setmarian, increasingly considered to have been a leader of the Madrid train bombers and who may have held a leadership role for al-Qaeda in Europe. Setmarian, aged 45 and of Syrian origin, was already wanted as part of a separate investigation into Islamic militant activity in Spain and is the subject of a Spanish wanted notice issued through Interpol. The US State Department said on November 18 it was offering a $US5 million ($6.3 million) reward for information leading to the capture of Setmarian, also known as Mustafa Setmariam Nasar or Abu Musab al-Suri. It described him as an al-Qaeda member and former trainer at "terrorist camps" in Afghanistan. Some 30 people are in custody or under court supervision for the train bombings for which one minor has so far been convicted. Seven prime suspects are dead and two or three other suspected collaborators remain at large. |
| Posted by:tipper |
| #2 Doesn't matter (except to those of us who care about the truth, and those who must act based on reality). The Anti-s have already muddied the waters so badly about Saddam's WMD, and Bush's intentions and abilities, that those who haven't been paying close attention will discount the FBI's evidence about this, too. I am sending my European friends copies of Michael Moore is a Big Fat Stupid White Man by Hardy & Clarke, in the hope that they will recognise the lies for what they are, thus clearing the ground for them to recognise the opposed truth. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2004-11-28 9:19:43 PM |
| #1 So much for the Spaniards' fervent belief that March 11 was payback for the Iraq War. Someday the pseudo-progressives will figure it out: it ain't about Bush. It's a fascist death cult, and they'll just as gladly saw the necks off of euro atheists, german tourists, scandinavian stoners etc as they will americans. |
| Posted by: lex 2004-11-28 2:25:50 PM |