FLASHBACK
Monday, April 26, 2004 Posted: 3:54 PM EDT (1954 GMT)
Jordanian officials seized tons of chemicals in what they say was an Al Qaeda chemical attack plot.
Jordanians say they thwarted an al Qaeda bomb plot that would have been worse than 9/11 attack.
AMMAN, Jordan (CNN) -- Jordanian authorities said Monday they have broken up an alleged al Qaeda plot that would have unleashed a deadly cloud of chemicals in the heart of Jordan's capital, Amman......
http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/04/26/jordan.terror/
Jordan's Zarqawi Financier Jailed Six Months
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=6668013
...excerpt...
AMMAN (Reuters) - Jordan's state security court jailed an Islamist militant for six months on Sunday for financing al Qaeda ally Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's bombings in Iraq but found no evidence to charge him with plotting any attacks.
Jordanian security sources told Reuters it was the first major interception of secret channels of funding of Jordanian militants to Zarqawi and his foreign fighters in Iraq.
The military tribunal found Bilal Mansour Hiyari, 34, from a prominent Jordanian tribe from the city of Salt, guilty on a charge of fundraising "for an illegal organization."
Prosecutors alleged Hiyari met fellow Jordanian Zarqawi in July 2003 in Iraq's rebel city of Falluja. Hiyari spent a month in Iraq before heading back to Jordan -- one of thousands of Arab militants to join in a Muslim holy war against U.S. troops.
The court's chief judge Colonel Fawaz Baqour said the court found insufficient evidence to prove that Hiyari conspired "to engage in terrorist acts" -- a charge which carried a possible death sentence.
Hiyari had pleaded not guilty to both charges at the start of his trial last month. He could have been sentenced to a maximum three years in prison for the fundraising charge.
"He just agreed with Zarqawi to collect donations and send it to Iraq to finance his military operations against the U.S. forces," Baqour said in the court decision.
"The defendant then came back to Jordan without seeking to do anything that would threaten the security and stability of the kingdom," he added.