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Brits downplaying aswats connections to attacks { August 3 2005 }

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   http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/235047_zambia03.html

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/235047_zambia03.html

Wednesday, August 3, 2005

Zambia to hand over terror suspect tied to Seattle visit
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER STAFF AND NEWS SERVICES

Zambian authorities are apparently ready to hand over to Britain a man accused of being an al-Qaida emissary who visited and lived in Seattle in 1999 and 2000 during a trip to set up a terrorist training camp in Oregon.

British police were initially anxious to question Haroon Rashid Aswat, a British Muslim of Indian descent, about the July 7 attacks on three subway trains and a bus in London that killed 56 people. But British news outlets are reporting that British intelligence officials are downplaying Aswat's possible connection to the attacks.

Aswat was an unindicted co-conspirator of James Ujaama of Seattle in the creation of the jihad training camp in Bly, Ore. Ujaama, who was prosecuted in U.S. District Court in Seattle for his role in the camp, has completed his prison sentence.

Federal criminal justice sources told the Seattle Post-Intelligencer that the FBI and its British counterparts have been in discussions with the Zambians over who should take custody of Aswat. Although British authorities do not have as much interest in Aswat as their U.S. counterparts, they may take him into custody rather than the United States because an extradition treaty exists between Britain and Zambia, The Financial Times said. Britain would then make Aswat available to the Americans, federal criminal justice sources said.

Aswat is under a sealed indictment in the Southern District of New York for his role in setting up the Oregon camp, according to a CNN report last week.

The FBI, which for years has believed that Aswat had been killed, now believes that the man held in Zambia is the same man who traveled to the Pacific Northwest.

Shortly after the bombings, agents in Seattle were working to see whether a man who visited Seattle was indeed the same person named as a suspect in London.

Aswat was detained in Zambia on July 20. Zambian Police Inspector-General Ephraim Maateyo said in a news conference yesterday that neither American nor British officials have yet been given access to Aswat.

"As long as he will have a fair trial, Zambia does not care" where Aswat goes to, Maateyo said. He declined to say when a decision on the extradition requests would be made.

This report includes information from P-I reporter Paul Shukovsky and Bloomberg News.


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Aswat suspected of alqaeda links { August 4 2005 }
Blair says not all muslims are bad { July 7 2005 }
Bombing suspect arrested in egypt
Brits downplaying aswats connections to attacks { August 3 2005 }
Doj blocked efforts to prosecute aswat { July 24 2005 }
Group claiming london attack also claimed easting blackout
London attacks linked to saudi arabia { July 31 2005 }
London bomber appears in farewell tape
New europe alqaeda misquotes quranic verses { July 7 2005 }
New europe organization claims responsbility for attacks
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Suspect haroon aswat confirmed as mi6 agent { September 25 2005 }

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