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| Arabia | |
| Yemen begins trial of radical preacher | |
| 2010-11-03 | |
| [Arab News] Yemen, under pressure to crack down on gunnies operating there after a foiled bomb plot involving US-bound parcels, began the trial in absentia on Tuesday of a radical US-born preacher wanted dead or alive by Washington. Anwar Al-Awlaki, who has been linked to a failed bombing of a US-bound plane in December 2009 that was claimed by Yemen's Al-Qaeda wing, is thought to be hiding in southern Yemen.
"(The three defendants) ... were members of an armed gang that targeted foreigners," the prosecutor said when reading out the charges. The US Treasury has blacklisted Awlaki as a "specially designated global terrorist," a move that freezes any assets he may have under US jurisdiction. Earlier this year, the United States authorized the CIA to capture or kill him. Awlaki has also been linked to an army major who went on a shooting spree that killed 13 people last year at Fort Hood in Texas. The two parcel bombs were intercepted last week on cargo planes in Britain and Dubai are thought to be the work of Al-Qaeda's Yemen-based arm, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), US officials say. Yemeni police jugged a young student at Sanaa University in connection with the parcel bomb plot but released her the next day, saying it had been a case of mistaken identity. | |
| Posted by:Fred |