Posted on 06/06/2003 6:20:35 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
PARIS - France has arrested a German man suspected of links to the September 11, 2001, attacks in the United States and a suicide attack at a Tunisian synagogue last year, police said on Friday.
Christian Ganczarski, 36, was arrested on Monday, one day after French police detained a Moroccan man also wanted in connection with September 11 attacks, blamed on the Al-Qaida network.
A French police spokesman said Ganczarski was suspected of links to the synagogue bombing in Djerba in April 2002 and the September 11 attacks, but it was not clear what role he may have played in either.
German prosecutors said Ganczarski was not believed to have taken a direct part in the synagogue attack, carried out by a man driving a truck loaded with cooking gas.
They said an intercepted telephone conversation with the truck driver indicated that Ganczarski knew of the timing of the attack beforehand through his close connections with leading Al-Qaida figures and did nothing to prevent it.
The truck exploded near the synagogue, the oldest in north Africa, killing 21 people, including 14 German tourists, plus the truck driver.
Ganczarski Der Spiegel, According to German weekly had previously been arrested in Saudi Arabia, but had been released.
A German magistrate last month rejected an application for an arrest warrant for Ganczarski. Local authorities said they did not have enough evidence to arrest him.
The French police spokesman said Ganczarski was due to be questioned by an investigating judge on Friday.
On Thursday, Moroccan Karim Mehdi was put under official investigation - one step short of pressing charges in France - for allegedly belonging to a criminal gang with links to terrorist activities.
Both Ganczarski and Mehdi were arrested at Paris's Charles de Gaulle airport.
Mehdi arrived on a flight from Germany and was waiting to fly to the French-ruled Indian Ocean island of La Reunion, where Justice Minister Dominique Perben said he may have been planning attacks.
"It seems that this person that was arrested a few days ago in Paris was planning to perpetrate or participate in attacks on tourist areas in La Reunion," Perben told reporters in Luxembourg.
"So far the inquiry is just beginning. It is worrying," Perben said at a meeting of European Union justice ministers.
A judicial source said Mehdi was suspected of links to a cell in Hamburg, Germany, which is accused of planning the September 11 attacks.
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