Alleged al-Qaida terrorist denies knowledge of plots
A man US authorities accuse of helping arrange financing for at least one of the September 11 hijackers says he is an ordinary businessman who has family ties to alleged terrorist Khalid Sheikh Mohammed but is not part of al-Qaida or other terrorist groups.
In statements to an administrative hearing at the US detention centre at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali, whom the Defence Department calls Ammar al-Baluchi, also asserted that during his nearly four years in US custody he gave US officials “vital information” to help foil terrorist plots.
The Defence Department today released a transcript of that hearing, which was closed to the public and the press.
He is one of 14 “high value” terror suspects held in secret CIA prisons before being sent to Guantanamo Bay last September.
Ali said Mohammed, who is his uncle, introduced him to September 11 hijacker Marwan al-Shehhi and others accused by the United States of being al Qaida operatives.
However, he said Mohammed never mentioned that he or they were involved with al Qaida or plotting attacks against the United States.
The hearing, known as a Combatant Status Review Tribunal, was held March 30. The purpose of the hearing is to determine whether the detainee is properly classified as an “enemy combatant” eligible for a military trial for war crimes.
During his hearing, a tribunal member asked Ali, who was born in Baluchistan but raised in Kuwait, if he helped hijacker al-Shehhi enter the United States by aiding him in obtaining a visa.
“I don’t recall,” Ali replied, according to the transcript. “Maybe I can because I have contacts. So that’s normal, but I don’t recall.”
In a written statement presented at the hearing in support of Ali, Mohammed said he never recruited his nephew for al Qaida.
“To my knowledge, Ammar has never had association with al-Qaida, Taliban or associated organisations,” Mohammed wrote.
“I am not aware of any knowledge that Ammar had about al-Qaida, Taliban or associated organisations.”
At his Guantanamo tribunal, Mohammed claimed he was responsible for dozens of successful and foiled attacks over the past 15 years.
Mohammed submitted a second brief statement claiming the United States has arrested thousands of innocent people as “enemy combatants", and he asserted that much of the classified evidence against alleged terrorists is from “confessions that were obtained under torture by the CIA.”
Another accused al-Qaida operative, Ramzi Binalshibh, who also is in custody at Guantanamo Bay, also submitted a statement saying Ali had no prior knowledge about the September 11 plot.
According to the office of the Director of National Intelligence, Ali is a member of an extended family of Islamic extremists, including his uncle Mohammed and his cousin Ramzi Yousef, who was convicted of masterminding the 1993 World Trade Centre bombing and accused of plotting to blow up US airliners.
An unclassified US intelligence profile of Ali says he played an important role helping the Sept 11 plot by transferring money to US-based operatives and acting as a travel facilitator for hijackers transiting the United Arab Emirates en route from Pakistan to the United States before the attacks.
