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| Europe |
| Rabei Osman Sayed Ahmed goes on trial in Italy |
| 2006-02-02 |
| An Egyptian man suspected of masterminding the March 2004 Madrid bombings appeared in a Miilan court on Tuesday at the start of his trial on charges of international terrorism, including conspiring to plan more attacks. Clad in white robes and a skullcap, a handcuffed Rabei Osman Sayed Ahmed was escorted by police into the courtroom. He was placed in a caged enclosure from where he listened to the proceedings through an interpreter. Ahmed's lawyer failed to show up, forcing trial judge Judge Luigi Cerqua, after a two hour delay, to appoint another attorney to represent the 34-year-old suspect. Italian police acting on a tip from their Spanish counterparts picked up Ahmed in Milan three months after the Madrid attacks. He is accused of recruiting extremists as the head of a terrorist cell. Spanish and Italian authorities consider Ahmed the main organiser of the bombings that killed 191 people and injured more than 1,500. Ahmed has denied any wrongdoing and says he has never belonged to a terrorist group. He claims he is not the person speaking in intercepted conversations that Italian police say prove his role in the attacks and show that Ahmed was indoctrinating militants for suicide bomb missions in Iraq and elsewhere. Italian police said in a report summarizing the investigation that Ahmed was also trying ''to construct cells at a European level in order to carry out terrorist actions on the model of Madrid.'' Also standing trial is 22-year-old Egyptian Yahia Ragheh, picked up in the same operation as Ahmed and described by authorities as a would-be suicide bomber. He too appeared in court on Tuesday and joined Ahmed in the cage. Ragheh's attorney, Roberta Ligotti, told reporters as she arrived at the tribunal that there was insufficient proof that Ragheh belonged to any terrorist cell and said prosecutors had only cited one phone call traced to her client in their evidence. |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |