[N8 v2.0]

AL-QAIDA Suspect Arrested in Texas
WTOPNEWS.COM & FederalNewsRadio.com | July 28, 2004 | J.J. Green

A South African woman picked up in Texas almost 10 days ago may turn out to be a key, high-level al-Qaida operative.

Her name is Farida Goolam Mohamed Ahmed. She was stopped at McAllen Miller International Airport on July 19 headed to New York.

Eddie Flores of the U.S. Border Patrol office in McAllen, Texas tells FederalNewsRadio.com that a review of her papers raised some concerns.

"In looking at her documents, they did not find any entry documents in her passport where she was legally admitted into the United States," says Flores.

Ahmed produced a South African passport to the agents with four pages torn out, and with no U.S. entry stamps. Ahmed reportedly later confessed to investigators that she entered the country illegally by crossing the Rio Grande River. Ahmed was carrying travel itineraries showing a July 8 flight from Johannesburg, South Africa to London. Six days later, Ahmed traveled from London to Mexico City before attempting to travel from McAllen to New York.

Government sources tell FederalNewsRadio.com that capturing this woman could be comparable to the arrest of Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of 9/11. It was revealed in court Tuesday that she was on a watch list and had entered the U.S. possibly as many as 250 times.

Tuesday, the South African government issued a warning that Al-Qaida militants and other terrorists traveling through Europe had obtained South African passports, and authorities believe they got them from crime syndicates operating inside the government agency that issues the documents.

 

[N8 v2.0]

More...

Bond Denied for South African Woman
www.krgv.net | Tuesday, July 27, 2004

An announcement Tuesday by the South African government, casts an intriguing light on the federal investigation of a woman stopped last week at the McAllen Miller International Airport while trying to board a plane to New York.

Farida Goolam Mohomed Ahmed is behind bars in a Willacy County federal prison, while agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation why she entered the United States illegally. Ahmed appeared before a federal judge Tuesday, to determine if there was any probably cause to hold her on charges of illegal entry, making false statements and altering her passport. The judge denied Ahmed bond.

Two Border Patrol agents stopped Ahmed on July 19 as she attempted to board a plane to New York. Ahmed produced a South African passport to the agents with four pages torn out, and with no U.S. entry stamps. Ahmed later confessed to investigators that she entered the country illegally by crossing the Rio Grande River. Documents seized from Ahmed’s effects include travel itineraries showing a July 8 flight from Johannesburg, South Africa to London, via Dubai in the United Arab Emirates. Six days later, Ahmed traveled from London to Mexico City before attempting to travel from McAllen to New York.

Earlier Tuesday, the South African government warned that terrorists may be using the country’s passports to travel the world after the discovery of a crime syndicate selling the passports. South African passports can be used to gain entry into European countries, or the United States more easily.

Sources tell NEWSCHANNEL 5 that Ahmed is being investigated for possible ties to terrorist organizations. Officially, the FBI will not confirm the investigation, nor will the U.S. Attorney assigned to the case. According to a Border Patrol spokesman, most immigrants caught entering the country are deported and skip court proceedings, unless they insist they have the right to be here. This is not the case for Ahmed. According to court documents obtained by NEWSCHANNEL 5, Ahmed never claimed her right to be in the country. NEWSCHANNEL 5 also learned that Ahmed, at one point, did have permission to travel to the United States. Her VISA expired in 1996. According to testimony Tuesday, she had spent at least three more years in the U.S. illegally after that.

 

[N8 v2.0]

Realted story...

AP: Terrorists Obtain S. Africa Passports
AP | Jul 27 | ALEXANDRA ZAVIS

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - Al-Qaida militants and other terrorists traveling through Europe have obtained South African passports, and authorities believe they got them from crime syndicates operating inside the government agency that issues the documents.

The illicit acquisition of the passports, which allow travel through many African countries and Britain without visas, sent shock waves through South Africa after one top police official said "boxes and boxes" of the documents were discovered in London.

Barry Gilder, director general of the Department of Home Affairs, told The Associated Press he has come across a number of instances in which South African passports were found in the hands of al-Qaida suspects or their associates in Europe - both in his current capacity and as a former deputy director in the National Intelligence Agency.

Gilder gave no specifics, and he described these as "isolated" cases. But he said his department is moving aggressively to counter the threat, dedicating more senior officials to fight corruption and introducing identity cards and passports containing microchips with the owner's fingerprints.

"We do not want our country to be used either as a staging post or haven for terrorists," Gilder told the AP.

South African officials say crime syndicates selling the country's identity documents and passports for as little as $77 have operated inside Home Affairs for years.

They sell mostly to economic migrants, who find it easier to enter Europe or the United States on a South African passport than ones from their own countries. But terrorists now appear to be tapping into these networks, Gilder acknowledged.

In one instance, a Tunisian al-Qaida suspect, Ihsan Garnaoui, told German investigators he had a number of South African passports, sources close to case told the AP. It is not clear how he got them.

Garnaoui was traveling on a forged Portuguese passport when he arrived in Germany in January 2003, on a journey via South Africa and Belgium. He is accused of planning bombings on American and Jewish targets to coincide with the start of the U.S.-led war on Iraq.

South African Police Commissioner Jackie Selebi called attention to the illegal acquisition of passports when he told the National Assembly's safety and security committee that a number of people with "evil intentions against this country" were arrested here and sent home shortly before April 14 elections. This prompted the arrests of suspected al-Qaida members in Jordan, Syria and Britain, he said.

"In part of this operation, in London, the British police found boxes and boxes of South African passports in the home of one of these people, or an associate of these people," Selebi said, according to local news reports. A transcript of his remarks was unavailable, and Selebi's office did not respond to requests for details.

The fact that these were genuine South African passports, not forgeries, was of particular concern, Home Affairs Minister Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula said.

"They (al-Qaida members) certainly did not pick up those passports out there in their countries," she told Parliament's Home Affairs committee in June. "A member of the department must have sold those passports to them."

The press office at Britain's Scotland Yard said it had no information on the matter, and officials at the Metropolitan Police and Home Office declined to comment.

South Africa's notoriously porous borders have repeatedly been exploited by international fugitives, including Khalfan Khamis Mohamed, a suspect in the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. But Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula said as recently as March that there were no al-Qaida cells in the country.

Selebi did not specify who was arrested in South Africa in April, or what action they allegedly planned. But two suspects who were later released - a South African and a Jordanian married to a South African - told the AP they were questioned about an alleged al-Qaida plot to attack American and British targets during the election, which coincided with the 10th anniversary of the end of apartheid.

The South African, Shaid Hassim, and the Jordanian, Mohammed Hendi, strongly denied any such plot, or involvement in supplying passports to terrorists. They said four others were also arrested in a series of raids and deported - two Egyptian brothers, one of them with asylum status in Britain, and two Jordanians.

Khaled Abdusalam was questioned for several hours upon his return to London and released, but his brother Mahmoud is believed to be in custody in Egypt, Hassim said. Jamal Odys and Walid Nassr were arrested after returning to Jordan, but Nassr was later released, according to Hendi. Officials in the three countries said they had no information on the suspects.

Hassim believes they were targeted because some of them belong to a British-based group founded by Jordanian exiles called Jama'ah Tul Muslimeen, which urged Muslims not to vote in South Africa's election.

On April 1, the day before the raids, all those arrested attended a dinner to which Odys brought four DVDs containing material he had downloaded from an al-Qaida Web site, Hassim said. Interrogators accused the group of being an al-Qaida sleeper cell, he said.

No charges have been announced against the men, and their group does not appear on any terrorist watch lists, according to officials in Britain and Jordan.

Local and international security analysts were skeptical that al-Qaida would target South Africa, which has been strongly critical of Israel's treatment of Palestinians and the war in Iraq. But they said it would be no surprise if members had established a presence or links here to support attacks elsewhere.

"There is a sense that corruption in South African institutions has made the place particularly vulnerable because people are able to slip in and out so easily," said William Rosenau, a terrorism expert at the U.S.-based Rand Corp.

He noted Osama bin Laden's group has a history of cultivating individuals precisely because they have passports that do not immediately arouse suspicion.

 

[fluff]

He noted Osama bin Laden's group has a history of cultivating individuals precisely because they have passports that do not immediately arouse suspicion.

Maybe that explains all the missed calls on my cellphone