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1999 : (MILAN, ITALY : MILAN TERROR CELL OF TUNISIANS AND MOROCCANS IS OPERATING BY THIS TIME, RECRUITING & FUNDRAISING THROUGH SALE OF FAKE ID TO ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS -- See GALLARATE MOSQUE, IMAM MOHAMED EL MAHFOUDI, YOUSSEF ABDAOUI , MILAN CELL, GSPC) "The suspects have been operating, with help from Italian collaborators, since 1999 using private businesses and cooperatives based in the province of Milan as cover," the financial police said in a [June 24, 2003] statement. The businesses were a front for producing Islamist propaganda and fund-raising through the sale of fake identity papers to illegal immigrants, police allege. Funds raised were transferred to accounts in at least 16 countries in Europe, the Middle East and North America. ----- "Italian police arrest six in crackdown on Islamist cell," Yahoo News - AFP, Tuesday June 24, 10:53 PM 2003
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Italy's financial police launched [in June 2003] a major swoop on an Islamist group said to have ties to the al-Qaeda network, raiding dozens of sites around Milan and arresting six for allegedly financing and abetting a terrorist organisation. In an operation unleashed at dawn, 170 officers searched around 40 sites including a mosque in the northern region of Lombardy, police said Tuesday. Five Tunisians and an imam, or religious leader, of Moroccan origin were arrested. A seventh Tunisian was also sought but is probably already imprisoned in Tunisia, police added. They are accused of giving logistical help to a cell of the Algerian Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC), a militant Islamic group waging a bloody civil war to overthrow the secular government in Algiers. "The suspects have been operating, with help from Italian collaborators, since 1999 using private businesses and cooperatives based in the province of Milan as cover," the financial police said in a statement. The businesses were a front for producing Islamist propaganda and fund-raising through the sale of fake identity papers to illegal immigrants, police allege. Funds raised were transferred to accounts in at least 16 countries in Europe, the Middle East and North America.
The detainees are accused of criminal association aimed at abetting and financing a terrorist organisation, false accounting, involvement in illegal immigration, receiving counterfeit documents and trafficking in stolen cars. One of the charged is 38-year-old Moroccan Mohamed el Mahfoudi, the imam of Gallarate mosque on the outskirts of Milan.
Also detained was a Tunisian political refugee, Youssef Abdaoui, who was already convicted in Bologna last February [2002] for receiving fake Pakistani visas.
----- "Italian police arrest six in crackdown on Islamist cell," Yahoo News - AFP, Tuesday June 24, 10:53 PM 2003