A Spanish prosecutor said he will seek jail terms of more than 74,000 years for each of three suspected al-Qaeda members charged with using Spain as a staging ground for the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks in the US.
A trial is expected to start in mid-March but no date has been set, the National Court said. Spain will be only the second country worldwide to put Sept. 11 suspects on trial, after Germany.
The three are the alleged leader of a Spain-based al-Qaeda cell, Imad Yarkas, and two alleged accomplices, Driss Chebli and Ghasoub al-Abrash Ghalyoun. Chebli is Moroccan while the other two are of Syrian origin.
Prosecutor Pedro Rubira said that for each suspect he will seek prison terms of 25 years multiplied by the number of people killed in the suicide airliner attacks. Rubira said the death toll in Sept. 11 was 2,973, so each suspect faces a possible sentence of more than 74,000 years.
However, under Spanish law the maximum amount of time a person can spend in jail for a terrorism conviction is 40 years. Spain has no death penalty or life imprisonment.
Rubira also said he wants the defendants to pay a total of 893 million euros (US$1.16 billion) in damages to the victims' families.
The three are among 24 people who are to stand trial in Spain as part of the same indictment. The other 21 are charged with belonging to a terrorist organization, weapons possession, fraud or other offenses -- not with actually helping plan the Sept. 11 massacre.
The other defendants include al-Jazeera journalist Tayssir Alouny, for whom the prosecutor is seeking nine years in prison, and Yusuf Galan, a Spanish convert to Islam who faces a sentence of 18 years.
In a 200-page writ, Rubira said he wants to present evidence that includes more than 100 wiretapped conversations among suspected cell members. He also wants to call Jamal Zougam -- a jailed Moroccan suspect in the March 11 train bombings of last year -- to testify. Zougam, accused of actually placing some of the 10 backpack bombs that killed 191 people in Madrid, was a close follower of Yarkas, according to court records.
The case stems from an indictment issued in September 2003 by Spain's leading anti-terrorism judge, Baltasar Garzon, against 35 people, later broadened to 40.
Garzon charged that Yarkas, a used-car salesman, provided financing and logistics for key Sept. 11 plotters. In the indictment, Garzon wrote that "it has become crystal clear" that Yarkas "had links to some of the perpetrators of the massacre."
Investigators on both sides of the Atlantic say that Spain -- along with Germany -- was a key staging ground for the Sept. 11 attacks.
In July 2001, Mohamed Atta -- believed to have piloted one of the planes that crashed into the World Trade Center -- attended a meeting in the northeastern Tarragona region of Spain that Garzon said was used to plan last-minute details such as the exact date of the attack.
The 24 who will stand trial are in Spanish custody. The rest of those indicted by Garzon are either fugitives, such as Osama bin Laden, or in custody in other countries.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique