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Thursday, June 13, 2002

New York native Abdullah al Muhajir, 31, reportedly went to Afghanistan to meet with Osama bin Laden's top aides after the Sept. 11 attacks.

After the Taliban's defeat, al Muhajir reportedly shifted to Pakistan, where dozens of al-Qaeda leaders, including chief bin Laden adviser Abu Zubaydah, hid with the help of Muslim extremists.

A senior intelligence Pakistani official told the Associated Press that an alleged associate of al Muhajir, Benjamin Ahmed Mohammed, was in custody and had been questioned by FBI agents. Mohammed's nationality is unknown.

Al Muhajir Refuses to Talk

Meanwhile, in Washington, al Muhajir has not been cooperating with U.S. investigators, senior law enforcement officials told United Press International on Wednesday.

In fact, he's been anything but.

"He wouldn't even admit he had been in Afghanistan," one official said. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, on a trip to help lower the temperature in the dispute between India and Pakistan, said earlier that the United States didn't necessarily want to prosecute the suspect, just find out "what he knows." That might not prove so easy.

U.S. investigators consider the suspect a particularly hard nut to crack with a lengthy criminal history, including murder.

Al Muhajir had been in Justice Department custody since he was arrested May 8. Last Sunday, U.S. investigators washed their hands of him and turned him over to the Defense Department as an "enemy combatant." The Defense Department has put him in the Navy brig at Charleston, S.C.

Al Muhajir's hard-nosed recalcitrance is in contrast to the position taken by Abu Zabaydah, former operational chief of al-Qaeda for terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden.

Zabaydah was wounded and captured in a firefight with Pakistani police, with help from the FBI, on March 28. Almost immediately, he was turned over to U.S. custody. The Defense Department has him stashed, along with hundreds of other al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters, at the U.S. Naval Base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Zabaydah has been talking, though U.S. investigators sometimes question the accuracy of what he is saying. He has been the source of several generalized alerts in the United States.

He is also believed to be one of the sources who put U.S. investigators onto al Muhajir's trail.

Al Muhajir had been out of the country since 1998. Though he was unemployed, somehow he was able to afford travel to Afghanistan and Pakistan. U.S. officials say they have proof that he spent much of that time training at al-Qaeda camps. His specialty was wiring bombs, and he did some research on radiological material, investigators said. A controversy is developing over the terms of al Muhajir's incarceration. As an "enemy combatant," he could be held indefinitely by the Defense Department without being brought to trial.

As a U.S. citizen in Justice Department custody – in fact, he was held as a "material witness" – al Muhajir had the right to a lawyer. That court-appointed lawyer has filed suit in federal court in New York challenging al Muhajir's indefinite detention. All documents in the suit are under seal.

Copyright 2002 by United Press International.

All rights reserved.

Read more on this subject in related Hot Topics:

Al-Qaeda

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