Tue, Oct 16, 2001 page6

• France tangled in al-Qaeda's web of terror operatives

  FRENCH CONNECTION Captured the day before the Sept. 11 attacks, suspects believed to be planning strikes on US interests in Europe are said to be al-Qaeda operatives

  • AP
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  The day before terror struck New York and Washington, French prosecutors began looking into an alleged plot to attack US interests in Europe, including the stately embassy building in Paris. The suspected power behind the scheme: Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network.

  A month later, nine people are in jail, awaiting possible trial. France's top anti-terrorist judge, Jean-Louis Bruguiere, is conducting the probe, which has spread across Europe and led to arrests in Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Italy and Spain.

  Window on al-Qaeda

  So far, there are no direct links to the Sept. 11 attacks, according to officials familiar with the investigation, in which all information is sealed from the public.

  But the French case appears to provide a window on the workings of al-Qaeda, from recruitment meetings in Afghanistan to operatives sitting at computer terminals in suburban Paris apartments, transmitting coded messages over the Internet.

  It also has led to a significant rise in intelligence-sharing between the US and France, officials from both countries say. "They've always shared, but it was more like, `I'll show you this, you show me that,'" said Alexis Debat, a former analyst at the French Defense Ministry. "Now, they've opened the valve."

  Officials are believed to be looking at whether Zacarias Moussaoui, a French-Moroccan arrested in August in the US, is connected to the French network. Moussaoui, who is from southern France, raised suspicions at a Minnesota flight school by telling instructors he wanted to learn about flying, but not landing, a plane.

  He is being held as a material witness in the Sept. 11 terror attacks.

  Familiar with terror's face

  France is familiar with terrorism on its own soil. In 1995, a series of subway bombings in Paris killed 10 people and injured more than 100. A year later, three people were killed in another subway attack. Neither case has been resolved in court.

  Police say bin Laden's deputies traveled to Spain earlier this year and apparently issued orders to an Algerian cell, now in custody, to attack US interests in Europe. Spanish police are getting increasing indications that suspects involved in that plot may have been in contact with the suspected hijackers from Sept. 11.

  In the French case, a majority of the nine suspects now jailed are French-Algerians.

  Seven people were arrested in a sting operation on Sept. 21 in the Essonne region south of Paris. An eighth, Kamel Daoudi -- apparently tipped off when he saw a TV news crew outside -- managed to escape to Britain but was caught and sent back to France.

  The ninth, Djamel Beghal, is potentially the prize. Arrested in late July in Dubai with a false passport, the 35-year-old French-Algerian poured out a wealth of detail during questioning there, according to French judicial officials who saw the account.

  `The time has come'

  He described meeting bin Laden operatives at mosques in Britain, traveling to Afghanistan for weapons training at an al-Qaeda camp, and meeting at bin Laden's home with his top aide, Abu Zubaydah, where he was told, according to some reports, that "the time for action has come" -- and asked if he was ready.

  Beghal also reportedly told investigators that Abu Zubaydah gave him gifts from bin Laden: a toothpick, a string of prayer beads, a flask of incense. His job was to oversee the mission against the Paris embassy sometime early next year, in which another man -- Nizar Trabelsi, a Tunisian soccer player -- was to detonate explosives attached to his belt.

  The embassy was never attacked, and US Ambassador Howard Leach has said he knows of no precise plan targeting the embassy.

  But the information was enough to have Beghal extradited to France. During questioning in Paris, however, he withdrew much of his original testimony which he said was extracted by force. He admitted he was trained in Afghanistan, but denied having orders to carry out a terrorist attack.

  Judicial officials said they were still taking Beghal's earlier account seriously and are now awaiting the results of a medical and psychological exam on Beghal.

  Meanwhile, experts are examining cellphone records, computer disks, and documents found in the possession of all the suspects, especially Daoudi, a 27-year-old computer student who worked for two years at a cybercafe.

  Daoudi has been described as the suspected communications chief of the plot -- using e-mails and images, perhaps coded, to transmit messages. Investigators are also said to have found frames of cell phones and dismantled alarm clocks in his apartment. He said he trained at a camp in Afghanistan, but denied being involved in any plans for attacks.

  Another,Nabil Bounour, also is said to have trained in a bin Laden camp. All nine are charged with "criminal association in relation to a terrorist enterprise" -- a charge that gets up to 10 years in jail.

  Every six months, a judge will decide whether there is enough evidence to continue holding them. But it could well be a year or even two before the investigation ends and the suspects go to trial or are released -- not rare in the French legal system.
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