Belgium

[Petronas]

Moroccan man jailed for anti-Semitic knife threat
24 June 2005

BRUSSELS — Antwerp Court sentenced in absentia on Friday a 22-year-old Moroccan man to six months jail and a EUR 550 fine for accosting and threatening a Jewish man last year. It is the first time that such a case of anti-Semitism has led to a trial and a conviction, newspaper 'De Standaard' reported.

The suspect, identified only as Chbaba B., confronted a Jewish man in Statiestraat on 7 June 2004 and said: "I am Palestinian and I want to kill all the Jews". He then brandished a knife in front of the victim. The Jewish man cycled to a nearby synagogue and alerted police, who later arrested the Moroccan. The suspect was found to be carrying a hacksaw. Antwerp Court ruled that B. was driven by deep contempt and by feelings of hostility to Jewish people. "The facts bear witness to unacceptable intolerance and are a form of psychological violence," the ruling said. Friday's ruling was the second time Chbaba B., who is living illegally in Belgium, has been convicted. In February 2004, he was sentenced to eight months jail for a violent theft.

The Forum of Jewish Organisations demanded and won a symbolic compensation of EUR 1 from the defendant on Friday.

Meanwhile, the court will hand down a ruling on 4 October in another case of anti-Semitic street aggression. In that case, the 23-year-old Bart E., of Antwerp, is accused of verbally abusing two Jewish youths aged 17 and 20 years old. He allegedly called them "dirty Jews" and threatened to head butt them.

http://www.expatica.com/source/site_article.asp?subchannel_id=24&story_id=21398&name=Moroccan+man+jailed+foranti%2DSemitic+knife+t hreat

[Petronas]

It would be interesting to know if the detained individual was of Middle Eastern origin.

Belgium (Country threat level - 3): On 15 September 2005, the U.S. Embassy in Brussels issued the following Warden Message: "The U.S. embassy would like the American community in Brussels to be aware of an incident that occurred on public transportation in the Brussels area that highlights the need for people to remain vigilant and be aware of their surroundings. On Wednesday, September 14, at approximately 6:05 p.m., on the Brussels public bus system (Airport Express Bus #12), a passenger displayed what looked to be a semi-automatic pistol; a struggle ensued with another passenger and the weapon was taken without any shots being fired. The police arrived shortly after the incident and took a statement from the individual who subdued the person with the weapon. Bus #12 is a public bus that originates at the Brussels Airport and stops by NATO headquarters before entering the city. "This is a reminder of the need to be vigilant while taking public transportation. Please continue to observe your surroundings both when boarding and while riding any mass transit system and report immediately to police, transportation employees, or other authorities anything that appears suspicious."

AIR SECURITY International - HOT SPOTS 9/16/2005

[Petronas]

Terror suspects appear in court, trial adjourned
3 November 2005

BRUSSELS — The trial of 13 suspected members of the terrorist network GICM started in the Francophone Brussels Court on Thursday morning. Three of the defendants — all of whom live in Maaseik in Flanders— requested that their lawyer be allowed to speak in Dutch, but the request was denied.

The three suspects are all Dutch-speaking, but are on trial in the Francophone court because the other 10 suspects are French-speaking. They requested that their lawyer be allowed to speak Dutch because their friends and family would be able to understand proceedings. Documents in the case dossier have also been written in Dutch.

The Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group (GICM) is suspected of holding links to the terror network al-Qaeda. One of the suspects is accused of assisting the bomb attacks in Casablanca in May 2003, while the group is accused of providing logistical support for the Madrid bombings in March 2004. Tight security was employed around the Brussels court building on Thursday and the trial has been adjourned until 16 November.

After the Algerian Armed Islamic Group (GIA) trial several years ago and recent proceedings against Nisar Trabelsi and Tarek Maaroufi, this is the 4th terror trial to be held in Belgium. However, it is the first time that the special terrorism law of 2003 will be applied. The new law opens up the possibility the men could be jailed for 10 years if convicted of belonging to a terrorist organisation.

http://www.expatica.com/source/site_article.asp?subchannel_id=24&story_id=25020&name=Terror+suspects+appear+in+court%2C+trial+adjo urned+

[Petronas]

Belgium (Country threat level - 3): Youths torched 15 vehicles across Belgium on 9-10 November 2005 for a fourth consecutive night, in what officials describe as an imitation of the continuing civil unrest in France. In Brussels, 10 cars were set on fire, with a majority of the incidents reported in districts with large immigrant populations, including Schaerbeek, Molenbeek and Anderlecht. Other cities affected by isolated incidents of unrest included Antwerp, Lokeren, Mechelen and Ledeberg. There were a number of arrests, but no reports of injuries. Belgian authorities have increased security patrols in Antwerp, Bruges and Brussels to prevent further incidents.

AIR SECURITY International - HOT SPOTS 11/10/2005

[Petronas]

Police prevention work thwarts Brussels rioting
14 November 2005

BRUSSELS — A week of intense police prevention work and a quick response thwarted the a call for rioting in Brussels over the weekend. From the start of last week, rioters were being urged via the internet to assemble in Brussels city centre to run amok on Saturday.

Local police from Brussel-Elsene and nearby zones deployed 300 officers to maintain law and order. A distinct police presence was felt in the city on Saturday. Federal police dispatched water canons and a helicopter, and federal riot police were also placed on standby, newspaper 'De Standaard' reported.

Groups of youths started gathering on Saturday night and headed at about 8.30pm in the direction of Henri Mausstraat, where they vandalised cafés by throwing tables and chairs. An estimated 80 troublemakers were involved in the unrest and police intervened immediately. About 50 youths were arrested in the vicinity of the stock exchange.

It remained relatively quiet elsewhere in Brussels, also in 'risk city districts'. The fear that the unrest around the stock exchange area was a diversionary tactic for riots in other city districts did not pan out. "The prevention measures have worked excellently in the past few days," police spokesman Johan Verlije in the zone Schaarbeek-Sint-Joost-Evere said. "Social workers have been able to convince the youths to not get carried away. Our patrols have scarcely experienced any tension in difficult districts."

However, two buses, five cars and several rubbish bins were torched. Four suspects — including a minor — were arrested in Sint-Lambrechts-Woluwe on allegations they set fire to a bus. Police arrested them after the youths were allegedly seen filming the fire with a mobile phone. The film also showed the suspects talking about how they had started the blaze, police said.

The public prosecution office is also investigating an arson attack on a truck on the Colruyt in Vilvoorde. Some 15 arrests were carried out across Brussels. Two of the detainees were minors and all of the youths arrested were Brussels residents.

There was no indication of unrest being sparked from outside the city and certainly not from French hooligans. The inflammatory language found on the weblogs has already disappeared. Specialist computer crime federal police officers are now tracking down the authors, but the public prosecution office has refused to comment further on investigations. The Interior Ministry's national crisis centre and Brussels police said there were no indications that an organisation was responsible for the calls to riot.

http://www.expatica.com/source/site_article.asp?subchannel_id=24&story_id=25293&name=Police+prevention+work+thwarts+Brussels+rioti ng

[Petronas]

The trial is due to start on Wednesday.

Unmasking Belgium's terror suspects
3 November 2005

They were arrested in Maaseik and Brussels: 13 terror suspects accused of links to the group behind the Casablanca and Madrid bombings. They are not accused of planning attacks on Belgian soil, but in providing logistical support to terror network Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group (GICM). Arrested between March and July 2004, the suspects are accused of giving shelter to suspects of the Madrid and Casablanca bombings or helping them obtain forged travel documents. The trial forms a test of a new Belgian terror law enacted in 2003, in which convicted members of a terrorist organisation can be jailed for 10 years.

All suspects were arrested after Khalid Bouloudou, 30, was arrested during a routine traffic inspection at Weert in the Netherlands. Of Moroccan ancestry, but born and bred in Belgium, Bouloudou was pulled over by police because one of his car lights was not working. He was making his way home to Maaseik just over the Belgian border, but was immediately detained because his name stood on an international arrest warrant as the alleged Belgian leader of GICM. Police then swooped on many of his co-suspects in March 2004 as 20 house raids were made in Maaseik in Brussels. The suspects had been under surveillance for some time.

In August, 13 of some 17 suspects were ordered to stand trial and after Thursday's procedural hearing, they will stand trial on 16 November. The trial will be conducted in French, despite a request from a lawyer of three suspects that he be allowed to speak Dutch throughout the proceedings. The request was denied because it was not made according to correct procedures. All suspects will now be provided with an interpreter if necessary.

But who are the defendants and what are they suspected of.


Suspects still in Belgium

Khalid Bouloudou, 30.
Residence: Maaseik, currently being detained in Vorst.
He is suspected of being the co-ordinator of the Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group (GICM) in Belgium. He went to Afghanistan in 2000 and later to Syria to study Islam, Flemish newspaper 'De Standaard' reported. The defendant's brother has denied Bouloudou is involved in terrorism, while other Moroccans in the town of Maaseik have also cast doubt on the allegations. In a town of just 23,000 on the border with the Dutch province of Limburg, Bouloudo's conversion to extremist Islam surprised many. Once known as a social, integrated youth, Bouloudou is known to have drunk alcohol, smoke cigarettes and marijuana before converting to extreme Islam. He grew a long beard while in Syria and Afghanistan and started wearing traditional clothing. Abdelkader Hakimi — who was sentenced to death in Morocco — visited him at his Maaseik apartment. Boloudou's sister Samira is married to Lahoussine El Haski, whose brother Hassan El Haski is suspected of involvement in the Madrid train bombings.

Abdelkader Hakimi, 39.
Residence: Schaarbeek, currently being detained in Sint-Gillis.
He is accused of involvement in the 11 March 2004 attacks in Madrid and 14 May 2003 bombings in Casablanca. He is allegedly the European leader of GICM.

Lahoussine El Haski, 29.
Residence: Maaseik, now being detained in Vorst.
He was allegedly a member of the religious council of GICM. He is alleged to have fought in Chechnya and Afghanistan. Married to the sister of Khalid Bouloudou.

Mostafa Lounani, 41.
Residence: Schaarbeek, now being detained in Vorst.
He is suspected of handling stolen stamps to forge passports. Police allegedly found in his house instructions for a mobile phone-controlled detonator.

Abdallah Ouabour, 31.
Residence: Maaseik, now being detained in Sint-Gillis.
Suspected of membership of a terrorist organisation. He went together with Bouloudou to Syria. In 2001, he is believed to have undergone military training in Afghanistan.

Rachid Iba, 25.
Residence: Maaseik, now being detained in Vorst.
He is suspected of supplying forged travel documents to Lahoussine El Haski to help him escape from Turkey. El Haski was travelling back from Afghanistan at the time.

Abdessalam Rambouk, 32.
Residence: Sint-Jans-Molenbeek, currently free.
Suspected of membership of a terrorist organisation.

El Mostapha El Abdeslami, 30.
Residence: Sint-Jans-Molenbeek, currently free.
Suspected of membership of a terrorist organisation. He was the manager of a snackbar where alleged GICM extremists met. Gave shelter to Hakimi.

Mourad Chabarou, 25.
Residence: Schaarbeek, now on remand in Sint-Gillis.
He allegedly knew the Madrid terrorists personally. In a bugged telephone call in Italy, Chabarou showed that he was prepared to die as a martyr in a conversation with Rabei Osman Sayed Ahmed — alias Mohamed the Egyptian — one of the suspected organisers of the train bombings. Offered shelter to one of the Madrid culprits, Mohammed Afalah, soon after the attacks were carried out.

Abdelhafid Kharbache, 36.
Residence: Brussels, currently free.
Suspected of membership of a terrorist organistion.

Abderahim Ouchaou, 32.
Residence: Brussels.
Suspected of holding links to terrorist organisations.

Taoufik Chakir, 24.
Residence: Schaarbeek.
Suspected of holding links to terrorist organisations.

Omer Abdul Hameed, 31.
Residence: Schaarbeek.
Suspected of links with terrorist organisations.


Foreign-held Belgian terror suspects

Besides the 13 alleged GICM members facing trial in Belgium, there are five other alleged Belgian GICM members currently being detained abroad. They will be placed on trial there first.

Khalid Oussaih, 32.
Residence: Maaseik, currently being detained in Syria.
He is suspected of loaning a passport to another suspected GICM member.

Hassen El Haski, 42.
Residence: none, now being held in Spain.
He is suspected of being the ideologist of GICM. Allegedly smuggled mujahideen from Afghanistan to Europe and Iraq. He was arrested last December on Lanzarote in the Canary Islands on suspicion of involvement in the Madrid attacks. He is the brother Lahoussine El Haski.

Abdeladim Akoudad, 37.
Residence: none, now being detained in Spain.
Suspected of the attacks in Casablanca and Madrid.

Mimoun Belhadj, 34.
Residence: Sint-Jans-Molenbeek, now being detained in Morocco.
Suspected of involvement in the attacks in Casablanca in May 2003.

Youssef Belhadj, 29.
Residence: Brussels, now being held in Spain.
Suspected of being the military spokesman of GICM. Is alleged to have claimed responsibility of the 11 March attacks in Madrid via a video message. An analysis of his mobile phone records indicates he was aware of when the Madrid bombings would occur five months before the attacks took place. Allegedly was asked by al-Qaeda in 1998 to organise the trafficking of forged documents to bring Afghan terrorists to Europe. He is the brother of Mimoun Belhadj.

http://www.expatica.com/source/site_article.asp?subchannel_id=24&story_id=25023&name=Unmasking+Belgium%27s+terror+suspects

[Petronas]

A very interesting article about the "Groupe islamique combattant marocain" (GICM). I predict that we will hear a lot more of them in Europe.

How a Town Became a Terror Hub
Thursday, November 24, 2005

MAASEIK, Belgium -- The phones at city hall began ringing nonstop one morning last year when several masked figures were spotted walking through the cobbled streets of this pastoral town. A small panic erupted when one of the figures, covered head to ankle in black fabric, appeared at a school and scared children to tears. It turned out the people were not hooded criminals, but six female residents of Maaseik who were displaying their Muslim piety by wearing burqas , garments that veiled their faces, including their eyes.

After calm was restored, a displeased Mayor Jan Creemers summoned the women to his office. "I said, 'Ladies, you can be dressed all in Armani black for all I care, but please do not cover your faces,' " Creemers recalled. "I tried to talk to them about it, but it was impossible. They said, 'We are the only true believers of the Koran.' "

What the city elders did not know at the time was that the women came from households in which several men had embraced radical Islam and joined a terrorist network that was setting up sleeper cells across Europe, according to Belgian federal prosecutors and court documents from Italy, Spain and France. Over the next nine months, Belgian federal police arrested five men in Maaseik, a town of 24,000 people tucked in the northeast corner of Belgium. Each was charged with membership in a terrorist organization, the Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group, a fast-growing network known by its French initials, GICM. With each arrest, investigators uncovered fresh evidence that placed small-town Maaseik at the center of a terrorist network stretching across Europe, the Middle East and North Africa. The town had served as a haven for suspects in the Madrid train explosions that killed 191 people in March 2004, for instance, as well as an important meeting place for the GICM's European leadership.

The Belgian investigation underscores the challenges that authorities in Europe face in tracking down sleeper cells and in sorting vaguely suspicious behavior from imminent danger. Police have made scores of arrests in Berlin, Paris, Rome, Stockholm and Amsterdam in the past two years to disrupt what were described as terrorist plots, although in many cases it remains unclear whether the threats were overstated or false alarms. The problem has become more acute since the attacks in Madrid and the July 7 subway and bus bombings in London, with many intelligence officials predicting that Islamic radicals will inevitably strike again on the continent.

In Brussels, 13 people, including a group from Maaseik, appeared in court this month on charges of belonging to a terrorist organization and providing logistical support to the Moroccan network. Despite an investigation that has reached into eight countries, Belgian authorities remain uncertain about the Maaseik cell's true mission . Police found no bombs, no guns, no blueprints for an attack -- just lots of worrisome evidence that the defendants were consorting with terrorism suspects from elsewhere and could have been planning something big. "We are quite sure that we have proved that they were a logistical support cell," said a senior official with the Belgian State Security service, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "But the fact is, the potential was there to do something more serious."

Maaseik is located in the Belgian province of Limburg, a few miles from the Dutch and German borders. Until recently, its chief claim to fame was as the home town of Hubert and Jan van Eyck, the 15th-century Flemish painters. About 800 people of Moroccan origin live in the town, many of them the children and grandchildren of immigrants. There is a new mosque in the center of town, but little overt history of Islamic radicalism.

That began to change after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States. A handful of men from Maaseik's Moroccan community started wearing long beards after returning from lengthy trips abroad. Some had been to Afghanistan, where burqas are commonly viewed as appropriate dress for devout Muslim women. Rumors that radicals were living in Maaseik spread to the offices of the Belgian State Security agency in Brussels, which opened a surveillance operation in the summer of 2002.

At first, intelligence officials suspected the Maaseik group was a ring to smuggle illegal farmworkers into Limburg. The agents dubbed their mission Operation Asparagus, after the vegetable that is widely grown in the region. As months passed, concerns grew.

In November 2003, several key figures in the GICM traveled to Maaseik from Spain and France for a rare meeting, according to Spanish and French court documents. The GICM's European cells normally avoided direct contact with each other so that they wouldn't attract attention from police. But the network had seen several of its leaders arrested in Morocco after terrorist bombings in Casablanca six months earlier and was trying to regroup, the court documents show. Maaseik was emerging as an important hub. Among those attending the meeting was Lahoussine Haski, a Moroccan with a history of fighting for radical Islamic causes in Chechnya, Afghanistan and other places, according to Belgian investigators and court documents.

Haski arrived in Maaseik holding a false passport, on the run from authorities in Morocco who had issued a warrant for his arrest on terrorism charges. In Saudi Arabia, he was listed by the government as one of the 26 most-wanted terrorist suspects in the kingdom for his alleged role in a series of bombings. After months of hiding out in Saudi Arabia, Syria and Turkey, Haski needed a refuge. Maaseik seemed safe. He married a local woman. Later, she would become one of the half-dozen women who caused a ruckus in town by donning their black burqas.

The GICM was founded in 1997 by Moroccan veterans of the jihad training camps in Afghanistan. Its goal: to take the fight back to Morocco, overthrow the monarchy and establish an Islamic republic, according to Moroccan and European counterterrorism officials. After the U.S.-led overthrow of the Taliban in Afghanistan in the fall of 2001, the Moroccans scattered. Many returned to their homeland. Others traveled to Europe, where they blended into the continent's fast-growing Moroccan immigrant communities.

On May 16, 2003, a dozen suicide bombers recruited by the GICM detonated explosives at several targets in the port city of Casablanca, killing themselves and 33 other people. Less than a year later, the GICM struck again -- this time in Madrid, carrying out the first major terrorist attack in Europe since the Sept. 11 hijackings. Spanish and European intelligence officials acknowledged they had underestimated the presence of the Moroccan radicals. "We didn't see what was going on in the shadows with the Moroccans," said Claude Moniquet, director of the European Strategic Intelligence and Security Center, a Brussels research organization. "In Europe, agencies were not paying them that much attention. The idea was that they were just logistical cells."

In the past two years, police have broken up GICM cells in Italy, Belgium, Spain, France and the Netherlands. Moniquet estimated that the GICM has a few hundred committed followers in Europe and North Africa, as well as 1,000 to 2,000 sympathizers. Some intelligence officials characterize the GICM as a loose alliance of cells that operate independently. Others say there is evidence that the network is more structured and that the sleeper cells bide their time until they receive orders from the central leadership.

In April 2004, French police arrested six alleged GICM members in Paris and charged them with supporting a "terrorist enterprise." As in Maaseik, however, investigators did not find evidence that a specific plot was in the works. Moustapha Baouchi, the alleged leader, told French interrogators that the cell raised some money and sporadically kept in touch with counterparts in Italy, Spain, Belgium and Britain. But otherwise it was content to wait, knowing that an assignment would eventually come. "In effect, we were a group united in jihad," Baouchi said, according to a transcript of his interrogation. "This jihad could well have taken place in Morocco, or in any other country that we chose to destabilize. Our group was ready because we possessed the military training."

The Maaseik cell began to unravel in January 2004. Khalid Bouloudo, a pastry chef who was born in the town, was stopped by police across the border in the Netherlands for driving with a broken taillight. After a routine records check, officers discovered he was wanted on a terrorism warrant in Morocco and took him into custody. The arrest jeopardized the surveillance operation being conducted by Belgian state security officials, who had not notified Maaseik's leaders of their investigation. After dodging questions from angry residents who wondered how a suspected terrorist could have been in their midst, Belgian federal police rounded up four other GICM suspects in mid-March. But investigators had only a partial grasp of the network's reach.

In early June 2004, they were tipped off by Italian anti-terrorism police about a Moroccan suspect in Brussels. In wiretapped conversations recorded by the Italians, the man was overheard telling another radical in Milan that he and three friends were ready to carry out suicide attacks in Belgium. Belgian police responded with several raids and made 15 arrests in what they called Operation Asparagus 2. "We don't know yet if they are active members of the GICM, of al Qaeda or of another terrorist group," Glen Audenaert, head of the federal police, said at a news conference at the time. "But that they were preparing an attack is beyond dispute." All but one of those suspects was later released, however, and it is unclear what, if anything, they were planning.

More arrests followed. In July 2004, Belgian police nabbed Lahoussine Haski, the most-wanted suspect in Saudi Arabia, in Maaseik after he returned from a trip to Syria and Turkey. Two months later, they arrested another Maaseik man and charged him with membership in the GICM. In December, Spanish police arrested Haski's brother, Hassan Haski, in the Canary Islands and charged him with trying to set up yet another GICM cell to launch attacks on the Spanish mainland. Investigators later concluded that Hassan Haski had visited Maaseik on six or seven occasions. Spanish court documents describe him as "one of the most important current leaders" of the network.

Christophe Marchand, an attorney for Lahoussine Haski, said his client was innocent. He said the evidence against Haski was based largely on coerced interrogations of GICM suspects in Morocco and France. "There was a lot of pressure put on these people," he said. "It's hard to know where all this information is coming from."

In Maaseik, residents still find it hard to believe that their town served as a hub for an international terrorist network. In an attempt to contain extremism, the town passed a law last year that bans anyone from wearing a burqa. The fine: 125 euros, or about $150. Five of the six Maaseik women who kicked off the burqa controversy have agreed to obey the ordinance. The only holdout: Samira Haski, wife of one of the GICM defendants and sister of another. She is challenging the measure in court, according to Mayor Creemers. "Sometimes, I see her on the street, still wearing it," he said. "She sees me, and she runs away."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/23/AR2005112302432.html

[Petronas]

Significant:
1. A convert to Islam, not a born Muslim.
2. A Belgian citizen, not an immigrant from an Arab country.
3. A woman.

Female Belgian suicide bomber hit Baghdad
11/29/2005 12:38:00 PM -0500

BRUSSELS, Nov. 29 (UPI) -- A woman who carried out a suicide attack in Iraq two weeks ago was identified Tuesday as the first European female suicide bomber. The Belgian anti-terrorism unit has confirmed that the woman was a Belgian citizen who converted to Islam after her marriage to a Muslim fundamentalist, news service RTL reported Tuesday. American military forces identified the woman at a combat scene in Baghdad. She was carrying recently issued Belgian identity papers which revealed she had traveled via Turkey. There are no traces of her radical husband who is believed to have organized her trip. Around 10 percent of all suicide bombings the last 25 years have been carried out by women from the Middle East or Asia. It is, however, a first for a Western woman who has converted to Islam.

http://www.upi.com/SecurityTerrorism/view.php?StoryID=20051129-115510-8347r

[Petronas]

Militants linked to woman suicide bomber held in raids
01/12/2005

Police in Belgium and France yesterday arrested 15 suspected militants believed to be linked to a Belgian woman who carried out a suicide bombing in Iraq last month. The 38-year-old convert to Islam blew herself up on Nov 9 on the outskirts of Baghdad in what security sources believe was the first suicide attack involving a European woman.

More than 200 heavily-armed officers raided addresses in Brussels and three other Belgian cities in the early hours of the morning. They arrested 14 people in an attempt to shut down the suspected network which smuggled the unnamed woman into Iraq. The Belgian federal prosecutor's office said that two Tunisians and three Moroccans were among those arrested, while police also seized documents. The fifteenth suspect, a Tunisian, was arrested near Paris. The man, who was not previously known to police, was taken into custody because he knew the husband of the suicide bomber. The husband, a Moroccan, is also believed to have died in Iraq, reportedly after being shot by American soldiers.

All those arrested were said by officials to be closely connected to the woman, a former drug addict and divorcee from the run-down French-speaking city of Charleroi. The network had been under surveillance for four months after Belgium received intelligence about a suspected terror cell, but the country's small and overstretched security services failed to detect the woman leaving the country, officials admitted. Glenn Audernaert, a senior police official, said: "It was through this organisation that the lady went to Iraq with her husband, but we only knew about her presence … once she was already there."

She is thought to have been taken to Iraq overland via Turkey by her husband, a Muslim extremist. Her suicide mission targeted an American military convoy but she only succeeded in killing herself.

US forces found a recent Belgian passport with her remains, triggering a European-wide intelligence operation. Claude Moniquet, an intelligence analyst and director general of the European Strategic Intelligence and Security Centre, said: "The family are completely devastated, but sadly this is the classic profile: someone with bad family ties, and a history of trouble with the law. It allowed terrorist recruiters to work on her."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/12/01/wterr01.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/12/01/ixworld.html

[Petronas]

IRAN : CONVERT STABBED TO DEATH
Monday November 28, 2005

An Iranian convert to Christianity was kidnapped last week from his home in northeastern Iran and stabbed to death, his bleeding body thrown in front of his home a few hours later. Ghorban Tori, 50, was pastoring an independent house church of convert Christians in Gonbad-e-Kavus, a town just east of the Caspian Sea along the Turkmenistan border. Within hours of the November 22 murder, local secret police arrived at the martyred pastor’s home, searching for Bibles and other banned Christian books in the Farsi language. By the end of the following day, the secret police had also raided the houses of all other known Christian believers in the city.

According to one informed Iranian source, during the past eight days representatives of the Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS) have arrested and severely tortured 10 other Christians in several cities, including Tehran. All the detainees have since been released. One of the arrested Christians was reportedly interrogated about his involvement in relief work after Iran’s deadly Bam earthquake in December 2003. Another working with a legal organization defending human rights was accused of using it as a “cover” for church activities. In addition, MOIS officials have visited known Christian leaders since Tori’s murder and have instructed them to warn acquaintances in the unofficial, Protestant house fellowships that “the government knows what you are doing, and we will come for you soon.”

A former Muslim of Turkmen descent, Tori had converted to Christianity more than 10 years ago, while in Turkmenistan. After he returned to his native Iran in 1998, Tori began to share his new Christian faith with friends and relatives. Within two years, a small fellowship of 12 believers was meeting in his home. But not all welcomed his message; at least one relative attacked Tori, scarring his face. In the past year he received several threats from Islamic extremists vowing to kill him if he did not stop sharing his Christian faith. Tori is survived by his wife and four children, ages 3 to 23.

He is the fifth Protestant pastor assassinated in Iran by unidentified killers in the past 11 years. Three of the five were former Muslims, under Iranian law subject to the death penalty for having committed apostasy.

Tori’s murder came just days after Iran’s new hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called an open meeting with the nation’s 30 provincial governors. During the session, an Iranian source told Compass, Ahmadinejad declared that the government needed to put a stop to the burgeoning movement of house churches across Iran. “I will stop Christianity in this country,” Ahmadinejad reportedly vowed. “This was apparently a green light from the president of Iran to go out and start killing Christians,” the source said.

Last week a Zoroastrian representative in the Iranian Parliament protested a slur against non-Muslims on November 20 by a top aide to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, supreme leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran. According to the government-run Entekhaab website, in a public speech Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati told youthful Basijis (members of a volunteer militia formed to enforce strict Islamic codes) preparing to join suicide missions that “non-Muslims are sinful animals who roam the earth and engage in corruption.” Jannati, who is secretary general of the powerful Guardian Council, is known to be a mentor and close advisor to Ahmadinejad. Iranian Member of Parliament Kurosh Niknam declared the comment, “an unprecedented insult to religious minorities.”

Over the past month, Ahmadinejad has conducted a broad shake-up within the government establishment, replacing hundreds of governors, ambassadors and senior ministry officials with young and mostly inexperienced Islamists. Yesterday students at Tehran University protested noisily when a religious cleric without even a high school diploma was appointed rector of the nation’s oldest university.

In November, the new director of prisons also transferred a number of political prisoners of conscience into criminal wards with convicted murderers and drug dealers. At least one of these political prisoners has been killed by fellow inmates, sparking the fears of Iranian Christians for the security of Hamid Pourmand, serving a three-year sentence at Tehran’s Evin Prison for refusing to renounce his conversion to Christianity.

http://www.compassdirect.org/en/lead.php

[Simon666]

This last one has just what to do with Belgium?

[NYer]

The partners of several suspected terrorists being detained in Belgium are ready to carry out suicide attacks in Morocco, it was reported Thursday. (http://www.expatica.com/source/site_article.asp?subchannel_id=24&story_id=25835&name=Wives+of+terror+suspects%27ready+for+suicide+ attacks%27)

[Petronas]

Simon666 wrote:
This last one has just what to do with Belgium?Nothing, it was placed under "Belgium" by mistake. It should have been placed under "Iran", of course. Al-Canine, please be so kind to move it to "Iran".

[Petronas]

Armed Belgian journalist entered EU summit
27 March 2006

BRUSSELS — A Belgian journalist armed with a pistol and plastic explosives came within striking distance of French President Jacques Chirac and German Chancellor Angela Merkel during last week's EU summit. Journalist Katleen Peeraer with commercial broadcaster VTM slipped past security checks into the Brussels summit venue on Thursday with a Baretta pistol in her baggage.

She slipped past security again on Friday with a bomb made of plastic explosives, Belgian newspapers reported on Monday. Peeraer claims she was able on more than one occasion to approach the two leaders while armed, news agency AFP reported. A colleague separately brought bullets for the pistol into the hotel where European leaders were staying. Peeraer works with the program Telefacts on the Dutch-speaking VTM network.

http://www.expatica.com/source/site_article.asp?subchannel_id=24&story_id=28785&name=Armed+Belgian+j

[Petronas]

Five Islamists jailed for up to eight years
15 September 2006

The Brussels court of appeal on Friday handed down sentences of between 40 months and eight years jail on members of the Moroccan Islamic group GICM for belonging to a terrorist group.

Four of the group had been trained in camps in Afghanistan and were given sentences of five, seven (twice) and eight years. They are expected to appeal again and face a new hearing, probably at the end of the year. The fifth man was given 40 months, reflecting his limited role as merely providing accommodation for the others and meeting places at his Schaerbeek snack bar as well as offering them the cover of employment in the restaurant.

Abdelkader Hakimi, who was given the heaviest sentence, was trained in explosives and had a key role in collecting funds from GICM's French cell, while the others were involved in transferring money and manufacturing fake documents.

The Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group (Groupe Islamique Combattant Marocain or GICM) is an extremist Islamic fundamentalist group operating in North Africa and suspected of having links with al-Qaeda. Its goals reportedly include establishing an Islamic state in Morocco. The group emerged in the late 1990s, apparently drawing on Moroccan jihadists who had fought or trained in Afghanistan. GICM is thought to be behind the May 2003 bombing in Casablanca that killed 45. An offshoot of the GICM, Salafia Jihadia, is thought to be responsible for the 2004 Madrid bombings.

http://www.expatica.com/actual/article.asp?subchannel_id=24&story_id=33119

[Petronas]

Third Night of Ramadan Rioting in Capital of Europe
Wed, 2006-09-27 11:32

It looks as if immigrants youths want to turn nightly rioting during the Islamic holy month of ramadan into an annual tradition. Around 8:30pm last night violence erupted again in Brussels, the capital of Europe. The riots centered on the Brussels Marollen quarter and the area near the Midi Train Station, where the international trains from London and Paris arrive. Youths threw stones at passing people and cars, windows of parked cars were smashed, bus shelters were demolished, cars were set ablaze, a youth club was arsoned and a shop was looted. Two molotov cocktails were thrown into St.Peter’s hospital, one of the main hospitals of central Brussels. The fire brigade was able to extinguish the fires at the hospital, but youths managed to steal the keys of the fire engine.

During the month of ramadan Muslims are required to fast during the day and are only allowed to eat after sunset. As Esther pointed out “What should be noticed about the riots is that they start after sunset. Besides the fact that they start after dark, it also gives the rioters enough time to break their fast and enjoy the traditional family meal. Sunset is around 7:30pm.” Tuesday’s and Monday’s riots began around 8:30pm.

Last night the police arrested 45 rioters. One of them will be prosecuted for assaulting the owner of a shop. Philippe Close, the chef de cabinet of the Mayor of Brussels, Freddy Thielemans, said that the authorities would continue their efforts to defuse the situation in a peaceful manner, but he announced that the police will be less complacent in future, “since we cannot tolerate that this [Marollen] neighbourhood falls victim to a problem from outside the neighbourhood.”

The immigrant youths claim that they are upset by the death of Fayçal Chaaban, a 25-year old criminal, in a Brussels prison last Sunday. Yesterday morning the authorities announced they would hold a meeting with the youths to hear their grievances about security in prison, but the meeting, which was due last night, could not take place because of the riots.

The authorities are especially nervous since the Belgian municipal elections are being held on Sunday October 8th. It is likely that the elections will be won by anti-immigrant, “islamophobic” parties. Since ramadan will not be over on October 8th and many immigrants might perceive a victory of the indigenous right (as opposed to their own far-right) as an insult, Muslim indignation over the election results in major cities may spark serious disturbances. According to a poll published today the Vlaams Belang party is set to win 38.6% of the vote in Antwerp (compared to 33,0% in the previous municipal elections six years ago).

http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/1384

[Petronas]

Belgian police detain 9 in anti-terrorism probe
02.17.07, 11:47

Belgian police briefly detained nine men on Friday in a joint operation with France against suspected terrorist cells linked to Islamist militants, the federal prosecutor's office said. Police held the men, whose identity was not revealed, for questioning after raiding their homes in Brussels and the towns of Verviers and Nivelles, seizing computers, books and other papers. "They were released in the evening as for now there is not enough evidence for arrests. But this does not mean there is no case," said Lieve Pellens, the federal prosecutor's spokeswoman.

Pellens said there was no direct link with a Belgian woman who was recruited by radical Islamists to carry out a suicide attack in Iraq in 2005. She declined to give further details other than that the Belgian operation was carried out in cooperation with French police investigating networks recruiting fighters for Iraq, including to become suicide bombers. In the French probe, 11 people were arrested this week, including nine suspected of links with al-Qaeda. French authorities said on Friday the network had been sending trainees to radical Islamic schools in Egypt before they went to Iraq.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3366125,00.html

[Petronas]

Airport Bomb A Hoax
Updated: 20:34, Friday February 23, 2007

Police say the phone call warning of a bomb at Brussels airport was a hoax. Officials received the call shortly before 7 p.m. local time. The area was cleared, but a search has revealed nothing. The airport has now re-opened.

http://news.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,30000-1253054,00.html

[Petronas]

Belgium on edge after thwarting Qaeda jail break
Fri Dec 21, 2007 5:35pm IST

Belgium stepped up security on Friday against a possible terrorist attack after arresting 14 suspected Islamic militants and thwarting what it said was a plot to spring an al Qaeda suspect from jail. "There are indications a terrorist attack could be in preparation," Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt told a news conference.

Federal prosecutors said the 14 arrested -- suspected members of a militant Islamic group -- had been planning an armed attack to free Nizar Trabelsi, a Tunisian, who was arrested in September 2001 for plotting attacks on U.S. targets.

Authorities increased police patrols at Brussels' international airport, on rail and metro networks in the Belgian capital and at commercial centres during the busy last-minute shopping period before Christmas.

"They were planning to use weapons and explosives to free him ... These means could be employed for another use," Lieve Pellens, spokeswoman for Belgium's federal prosecutors, told a news conference. She added that investigators were not aware of any other specific plan at this stage. Pellens said Trabelsi was arrested in Belgium for planning to attack U.S. targets. He subsequently told a radio station he had planned to target a Belgian airbase thought to house U.S. arms. Belgium hosts NATO, the European Union institutions and the offices of a raft of multinational companies.

http://in.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idINIndia-31081520071221