[John H K]

Actually, to be technical, there ARE NO "correct" spellings of either name.

Arabic, like Chinese and Russian, uses a non-Roman alphabet.

Russian and Chinese currently have a standardized "official" transliteration.

However, they did not always have these (Beijing used to be "Peking" and if you read old books on the Napoleonic Wars you'll see weird spellings of Russian names.)

But there's no current, standardized transliteration of Arabic names.

That's why you'll see Gaddafi, Khadaffi, Gadafy, etc. for the leader of Libya. Each media outlet tends to pick one and stick to it.

Now, in the case of Moussaoui, I suppose the name as transliterated on US travel documents could be considered "official" in his case....

[GarySpFc]

I'm married to a Russian lady, and have been studying the language for four years, and can well appreciate there are various ways to spell Russian and Arabic words.

[Steve_Seattle]

"Actually, to be technical, there ARE NO "correct" spellings of either name."

Well, there are alternate correct spellings based upon which translation conventions you use, but a lot us aren't hitting ANY of the targets.

[AZamericonnie]

Arabic, like Chinese and Russian, uses a non-Roman alphabet

I nominate John H K for Chief of the Spell Police. A person qualified for the job! :)