Families of terror suspects say sons are innocent
The families of two Indian doctors detained in connection with failed terror plots in Britain today insisted that the young men were innocent and had nothing to do with terrorism.
Australian authorities say they detained Muhammad Haneef, 27, on Monday night at Melbourne airport as he tried to board a flight, and he was arrested based on information forwarded by British officials.
“He has been detained unnecessarily. He is innocent,” Qurat-ul-ain, Haneef’s mother, said in the southern Indian city of Bangalore. She said he was heading to India to see his newborn daughter when he was arrested.
Zakia Ahmed, the mother of Sabeel Ahmed, 26, who was detained Saturday in Liverpool, said both men were innocent.
“Both these boys are just caught in between,” Zakia Ahmed, a doctor, said today in front of her Bangalore home, about 7 miles away from Haneef’s home.
She said she spoke to Ahmed briefly yesterday and he was “keeping well.”
“I asked the people if I should come over to help; I asked my son also,” she said. “He said: ’If I need you, I will contact you.”’
She said Haneef and her son were friends and were related, though she didn’t explain how. They studied at the same medical college in Bangalore, she said.
A childhood friend of Ahmed, Shiekh Rehmatullah, today defended the man he has known for 20 years.
“He is not like that. He can’t be a terrorist,” said Rehmatullah, 25. “We have played together since childhood. I’ve known him for the last 20 years. They’re very good people – the whole family. They’re very educated.”
Haneef, the son of a school teacher, was raised in the Karnataka state town of Moodigere. His family now lives in an apartment in an up-market area of Bangalore where they moved after his father died 10 years ago.
He studied at the Rajiv Gandhi Health University’s medical college in Bangalore from 1997-2002, The Times of India newspaper quoted S Sachhidanand, a university registrar, as saying.
Haneef and Ahmed are two of eight men – all of them health workers – detained in connection with failed car bomb plots in London and Glasgow.
Officials in Australia, where Haneef worked at a hospital, have noted publicly that Haneef had a one-way ticket when he was arrested at the airport.
Sumaiya, Haneef’s sister, said Haneef was coming to Bangalore from Australia to see his daughter, who was born a week ago. Sumaiya uses one name.
“He called us before leaving (Australia). We came to know about his detention through media,” Sumaiya said.
“He is a responsible citizen of the country and the Indian government should help us get him back,” she said. “His aim has been to be a good doctor.”
The family hasn’t been able to contact Haneef.
“He is all alone there. I am frantically trying to contact him in Melbourne through the Indian Embassy,” Haneef’s wife, Firdous, told The Times of India.
E Ahamed, India’s junior external affairs minister, said the Indian Embassy has sought the Australian government’s permission to meet Haneef.
