Hunt for al-Qaeda 'logistical supporters''
01 August 2002
In the Netherlands, the hunt for so-called logistical supporters of the al-Qaeda network is concentrating on the Groupe Salafiste pour la Predication el le Combat (GSPC) (which separated from the Algerian Groupe Islamique Armé, GIA). According to the Dutch General Intelligence and Security Service, the GSPC maintains contacts with al-Qaeda. At the end of last year, four people were arrested in Rotterdam, allegedly in relation to the attacks of 11 September (see Statewatch vol 12 no 1). One of those arrested was released because of a lack of evidence and another was freed because of a curious miscommunication between the public prosecutor and the Immigration and Naturalisation Service. The lawyers for the remaining two accused have called the second person as a witness, but he seems to have disappeared, (suspicion has been voiced that this individual was an informant, infiltrator or agent of the French Intelligence Service). In June a court extended their detention by a further three months, for the second time. On 21 June, the police arrested Adel T., alias Amine M., in Montreal, Canada. He had been living at the same address as the four people arrested last year (see Statewatch vol 12 no 1). Adel T. will be extradited to Holland and testify in the case against the two men who are still detained.
On 24 April 2002 ten more people, mainly Algerians, were arrested in the south of Holland, at Eindhoven, Bergen op Zoom and Groningen. Five of them were released immediately because of lack of evidence, another was placed in an immigration detention centre for lack of documentation. The other four were detained in Breda prison awaiting their trial. On 5 June one of the men (hereafter RD) managed to escape by binding his bed sheets together and climbing down them. The fact that RD escaped led to questions in the Dutch parliament. A project manager, involved in the building of the prison security network in 1992, said that it was impossible that the person did not have help from inside. After climbing down the bed sheets, he had to climb a wall. The project manager stated in the BN/De Stem regional newspaper that "not even a bird can pass these walls". A large-scale search was organised by the police without any result. The three other detainees are still imprisoned.
On 6 June 2002 a special police team raided a house by mistake where four Iraqis lived. A neighbour observed the police action and said that he saw the men lying face down on the ground with their heads covered. The police said that it was a very well prepared action. One of the men is the father of Arkan A, a refugee granted asylum in Holland, who was visiting his son.
The four men were playing dominos in the house when they heard yelling, and were thrown to the floor. Not until they reached the police station in Assen did they realise they had been arrested by the police. The neighbour who watched the arrests at first thought the operation was a robbery, asking one of the men if he should notify the police. The carefully planned and prepared police action ended in the police station, where the men were told that their arrests had been a mistake. Why the police officers did not identify themselves during the operation and why the action was carried out in such a violent manner, remains unclear. In the middle of the night the men had to go home by themselves by taxi. When they arrived a police car brought the keys to the house. At 5.30 am they checked the house and found that all the personal files had been disturbed. During an investigation in the hospital it became clear that the nose of the father of Arkan A. was broken and that he had a crack in the bone of his left lower arm.
Six days later, a 19-year old man was arrested in Groningen who is also accused of being member of the GSPC. The police found passports in his house which, according to the Public Prosecutor, were false. This was probably the man the police sought during the arrest of the Iraqis.