Increased security for PM Lester Bird of Antigua<P> Mohammad and Malvo

Antigua Sun ^ | 11/11/02

[TexKat]

A number of steps are being taken to beef up security in the country.

This follows information coming out of the preliminary report of the task force put in place to look into the circumstances of US sniper suspect, John Allen Williams-Muhammad, being able to obtain an Antigua & Barbuda passport.

According to sources close to the investigation, indications are that Mohammad was able to slip forged documents past officials at the passport office.

It was also revealed that Muhammad was part of a plan to kidnap Prime Minister Lester Bird for a ransom, as well as plans to rob one of the country’s banks.

Speaking on national television last Wednesday night, the Prime Minister said that security had been tightened.

“We are putting in place some additional measures. I do have a tendency to drive around the country all by myself, and I think I am going to have to reduce that quite a bit. Because this is a serious guy and more information is coming out which will be revealed by the task force as to how serious he really was....”

Mr. Bird said he would be placing the security of prime ministers on the table when he meets with other Caricom Heads of Government at the next summit.

Muhammad, along with his accomplice Lee Malvo, is now in custody in the US where he is accused of being the sniper that terrorised the Washington area last month during a shooting spree which left a number of people dead and injured.

Muhammad and Malvo lived in Antigua two years ago.

[TexKat]

Is this a ploy by Prime Minister Lester Bird or will we finally find out which terrorist group M&M are members of?

[TexKat]

Ping

[TexKat]

Ping

[swarthyguy]

He's alqaeda affiliated and a member of NOI 5 percenters etc.

Actual membership is irrelevant; alqaeda is a larger jihadi movement in addition to a small core. His travels etc mirror those of jihadis. And his ideology and opinions are jihadist.

But it'll be potrayed as him losing custody of his kids that set him off when it was probably the alqaeda announcements of late summer.

Anyone remember a coup in TrinidadTobago a few years ago involving muslim types?

[TexKat]

Trinidad Tobago:

http://www.stlucia.gov.lc/pmpressec/cia_searching_for_libyan_military_students.htm

[madfly]

Found this story on Lester Molester at www.grenadiantimes.com.
Not sure of the date. Latests news update at this site is Sept. 14, 2002.

Source

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Bird threatens court action against sex, drugs allegations
St. John's - Antigua is engrossed in the drug and sex scandal surrounding Prime Minister Lester Bird, his brother and another top official even though for a second successive day the country's leader disclaim the allegations as a pack of lies. Prime Minister Bird on Wednesday wrote to the country's drug czar asking for a "full investigation" into the allegations. And the same time he has threatened legal action against the Observer newspaper for repeating what he considers the libel contained in the tape in a newspaper article which was published on Tuesday calling for his resignation. The article came a day after Prime Minister Bird, for a second successive day, denied the accusations of a teenage girl that she performed sexual and drug favours for him. In an address at Labour Day celebrations Monday Bird again denied the allegations and said they were concocted by opponents, led by Antigua's Observer media group, to destroy his government. "I'm very, very angry to the depths, the level, to which they would sink to try and bring this government down," he told a Labour Day rally Monday. Bird claimed the DEA had dismissed the allegations, saying "I'm not unaware that this video was passed to the US Drug Enforcement Agency and they would not even countenance the allegations." The Daily Observer newspaper claimed Tuesday that the girl "is under a US government witness protection programme." DEA spokesman Waldo Santiago, speaking from the agency's Caribbean headquarters in San Juan, Puerto Rico, said he had heard nothing about the allegations and would make inquiries. The video shows the girl speaking with two unseen reporters about incidents she claimed happened in 1999 when she was 14 years old. She is never identified by name but said she was born in Suriname and carries a Guyanese passport. She said she met the prime minister and his brother, Ivor Bird, at a party. "My first (sexual) encounter was in his office," she said of the prime minister. "He approached me and I didn't turn him down." She also alleged that she made payments for cocaine deals on behalf of the prime minister, his brother, and Chief of Staff Asot Michael. "They were involved in other illegal activities. They told me they needed a favour. I did it," she said. Bird told the rally he had "never met the young woman at anytime in any place." He said the girl's mother had come to his office "to complain about her daughter, and her frequent escapes from home." But he did not explain why the mother would come to him. The girl described one incident in which she said she paid for 50 kilograms (110 pounds) of cocaine that a Venezuelan boat dropped off on Antigua's east coast. She said Ivor Bird had arranged the transaction, and paid her $3,000. "The prime minister knew about it. He didn't say it was OK, but he didn't stop me," she said. Still fuming at the allegations, Bird Tuesday told Head of the Office of National Drug Control and Money Laundering Policy, Wrenford Ferrance that "you are hereby free to investigate this matter as it relates to me and other government officials." The prime minister also stated in his letter that Ferrance "to proceed according to law without fear or favour" against him and other government officials should he find that the allegations made in the videotape are true. Meantime. reports here Tuesday said one of the interviewers on the videotape, Julius Gittens, a former employee of Observer Radio who is now in Barbados, issued a statement in which he denounced the distribution of the tape. The report quoted him as saying that he was ordered to participate in its making by his employers, the Directors of the Observer Group. Gittens was further reported as saying that he "never intended or supported the distribution of the videotape." He claimed that he had provided the finished tape to the Directors of the Observer Group on the understanding that it would not be published unless further information was received supporting the allegations of the girl who was interviewed. Prime Minister Bird has given the publishers of the Observer newspaper until Thursday to apologise publicly for a story they published on Tuesday in relation to the matter which he claims libelled him. In an article "Lester must step down pending investigation" the newspaper reported on the contents of the videotape. In the article, the Observer stated, "Unconfirmed reports state that the prime minister received a copy of the tape sent by a person or persons unknown marked, "for old times sake." Bird's lawyers, who demanded the retraction of the story and a full public apology, pointed out that by the content of the story, the Observer "attempted to confirm that the allegations on the tape are true notwithstanding the prime minister's denial of knowing the young lady." "If the Observer does not withdraw its story and publicly apologise, the prime minister's lawyers will enter a suit for gross and aggravated libel in the Courts," a government statement here said late Tuesday.