June 05, 2003

"French Arrest Two Men in Sept. 11 Probe"

From this:

French authorities investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks in the United States have arrested two men - a Moroccan and a German believed to be a top al-Qaida recruiter - in the last two days at the Paris airport, judicial officials said Thursday.

The officials said they believe there's a link between the two suspects.

On Sunday, Karim Mehdi, a 34-year-old Moroccan, was taken into custody at Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris, the officials said on condition of anonymity. He had arrived from Germany and planned to leave to the French island of La Reunion off southeastern Africa.

Mehdi allegedly was planning a terror attack against a tourist complex on the island, the officials said. Further details about the site or timing of the attack were not immediately available.

On Monday, Christian Ganczarski was apprehended at the airport and was to appear before an anti-terrorism judge in the coming days, the officials said on condition of anonymity.

Ganczarski also allegedly had links to the April 2002 suicide bombing of a historic synagogue on Tunisia's tourist island of Djerba that killed 21 people, including 14 German tourists, the officials said.

(The previous entry linked to this article, which just mentioned Mehdi, and didn't have as many details as the one above.)

Posted to Terrorism at June 5, 2003 01:18 PM

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