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NPR is reporting that the Department of Justice is going to amend its indictment against Aafia Siddiqui. She had a map on her that showed Plum Island where virulent Ames was located, as I recall. Now that likely is just because it is near the Statute of Liberty but Aafia is astonishing nonetheless.

When the Department of Defense recently issued formal charges against Al Qaeda members who were involved in plotting 9/11, former CIA Director George Tenet noted in his 2007 book: “The most startling revelation from this intelligence success story was that the anthrax program had been developed in parallel to 9/11 planning.” It is interesting, therefore, to consider what an operative like Aafia knew or thought about anthrax.

When various non-pilot hijackers purchased their tickets in late May 2001 and June 2001, they listed the phone number of Al-Baluchi, the future husband of Brandeis PhD Aafia Siddiqui, as their contact number. He was in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Later in June 2001, other hijackers listed al Hawsawi. Al-Hawsawi’s was KSM’s assistant. KSM says it was al-Hawsawi’s computer that had the anthrax spraydrying documents. Al-Hawsawi was also in Dubai. In the formal charges, the Department of Defense alleges that Al Hawsawi and Al-Baluchi (Ali Abdul Aziz Ali) both assisted the non-pilot hijackers by buying clothes, food, lodging, rental cars, traveler’s checks and making travel arrangements. Al-Baluchi (Ali Abdul Aziz Ali) returned to Karachi from Dubai on June 26, 2001. Al-Baluchi told KSM, who was his uncle, that he was willing to do anything to help the Planes Operation. KSM advised him to also apply for a visa. In late August 2001, he applied for travel to the US on September 4, 2001 but his visa was rejected. On September 10, 2001, al-Baluchi flew from Dubai, United Arab Emirates to Karachi. If his travel visa for travel to the US had been accepted, what would have been his role? He later married the pious sAafia Siddiqui, a Brandeis PhD, in the spring of 2003, shortly before his capture. (Al-Hawsawi had taken over for KSM upon KSM’s capture a couple months earlier). Had al-Baluchi known Aafia Siddiqui prior to 9/11? Did Aafia have foreknowledge of 9/11? Is it true she met anthrax planning head Atef in June 2001 in Africa? Aafia’s attorney once said she could prove Aafia was in the US in June 2001. Aafia’s family, however, prevailed upon the attorney not to subpoena Aafia’s credit card records as she had planned. Aafia left the US for Pakistan in a hurry on September 19, 2001, booking the first available flight. Where is Aafia now? Was she in ISI custody as Aafia’s family and lawyer claims (picked up in May 2003)? Why was ISI refusing to cooperate with the CIA as happened with Ayman Zawahiri’s anthrax infiltrator Rauf Ahmad, the scientist who infiltrated the UK biodefense establishment?

As I’ve said for years, the forensic evidence most useful in proving the source of the acquisition of the Ames strain was going to be the inverted plasmid and mixed strain. Dr. Read, a scientist helping with the Amerithrax investigation in the DNA sequencing, long ago published the news that the anthrax was a 50/50 mixture of genotype 62 (Ames) and genotype 62 with an inversion on the plasmid. At Houston, where Aafia has a connection, graduate student Melissa Drysdale at Theresa Koehler’s lab in Houston in Spring 2001 — just as the lab was ramping up to BL-3 — rendered a strain virulent from avirulent by inserting the virulent plasmid into an avirulent strain. Did Aafia visit Houston in June 2001 after she finished her PhD? There was a massive flood at the lab then and the doors were left propped open.

In early November 2005, an Assistant United States Attorney said in his opening argument in the prosecution of Uzair Paracha, that an unnamed woman, if asked would “help carry out a deadly Anthrax attack against the United States.’” It earlier had been reported that the defendant, Uzair Paracha, had agreed to help KSM and an operative in connection with some ID documents. The AUSA was referring to Al Qaeda supporter Aafia Siddiqui. One ACLU lawyer representing the family described the doe-eyed Aafia as a soccer mom driving a Volvo.

In early 2002, Aafia Siddiqui had opened up the Post Office box that was to be used in connection with the documents. In January 2002, she was still married to her husband when she came back to the US, interviewed at SUNY and John Hopkins, and opened up a PO Box in Maryland for operative Majid Khan. She filed for divorce from her husband in 2002. Her divorce came through in August 2002.

Aafia Siddiqui studied neurological science and has studied at MIT and Brandeis University in Massachusetts, as well as at Houston, Texas. The Wall Street Journal has reported that according to witnesses discussed in a UN dossier, Aafia Siddiqui reportedly met with Al Qaeda’s military commander, Atef, in Liberia in June 2001. There is a difference of opinion as to whether the key witness is credible. Although he drove the woman around, perhaps his desire for a visa to the US influenced his recollection when he saw Aafia’s picture in the paper. Aafia’s attorney emphasizes that witness identifications are inherently unreliable.

In Maryland, Aafia visited a cousin in Gaithersburg and helped Majid Khan in connection with possible attacks by opening a mailbox in his and her name. Her family argues that it is her husband, Mohammed Ahmad Khan, who has made her look guilty — for example, by using her e-mail account to buy night goggles and a book on how to make explosives. According to one report, Aafia left for Pakistan on September 19, 2001 and so was not in the country at the time of the second mailing. She returned from Pakistan briefly for interviews. At last report, she had 3 children.

She and her ex-husband, a Harvard-trained anesthesiologist at last report living in Karachi, were officers of Institute of Islamic Research and Teaching Inc. In the mid-1990s, she worked for the United Islamic Organization (”UIO”), an education and relief organization. Her mother was President and her sister also volunteered. Through the group, for example, Siddiqui raised money for Bosnian refugees and the widows and orphans from that conflict. The organization was founded in Zambia in 1974 by Ismat Siddiqui. Its head office is in Karachi, Pakistan and on paper has branches in the United States, Canada, and Saudi Arabia. Perhaps the reality is as the family’s first attorney described to me: Aafia’s father set up the charity as something for the mom to do, who ran it out of her home. Any branch offices were run out of residences. In addition, Siddiqui was found to be active with the Al-Kifah Refugee Center, the Boston branch of an Islamic charity that was ostensibly raising funds for Bosnian orphans but which also was under scrutiny by federal investigators as a front for Al Qaeda and whose Brooklyn office was associated with the Blind Sheikh.

In April 2003, Aafia’s mom, Ismat, said she last saw her daughter on March 30, 2003 before Aafia left in a minicab along with her three children to go to the capital Islamabad. She was going to visit a friend and uncle. She called her mom from the train station — she did not have money for plane tickets. (Rail by far is the easiest and most efficient means of traveling to Islamabad, far in the north). She never made it to see her uncle. Pakistani government officials tried to calm her fears — telling her to be “patient and not rely on media reports” about Aafia’s fate. The authorities have denied having Siddiqui in custody prior to last month. Then they took her to a conference room and shot her in the gut. Let the marine explain that one to his mom.

“Rest assured, my daughter has nothing to do with al-Qaeda or any other organization,” Ismat said. In April 2003, when reporting the disappearance, she said neither Khan nor any member of his family had been in touch since she vanished. She claims Aafia’s husband abused her, a charge that the husband’s brother and father denies.

Her family has an explanation that this is all a case of mistaken identity.
Back in 2003, Ismat Siddiqui, Aafia’s mother, reported that a stranger came to her house and told her that her daughter was safe and that she should not raise a “hue and cry” for her release. She says he told her not “make too much noise about Aafia if you want her to return safely.” He also threatened her that if she made the matter public, her daughter would meet the “same fate as Asif Bhuja met.” (Bhuja was a suspect in the murder of Danny Pearl but was found dead when police arrived to question him; Saud Memon, the man who owned the property where Pearl was kept was later reported to have been involved in financing Al Qaeda’s anthrax efforts and years after being captured was left for dead on his family’s doorstep.)

A family member in the US hired an attorney who has inquired of the FBI as to Aafia’s whereabouts but the FBI reported that they did not have her in custody. Aafia Siddiqui’s family has long-standing ties with the family of Pakistan religious affairs minister Mohammed Ijaz ul-Haq. Ul-Haq’s late father — Gen. Zia ul-Haq — gave Izmat Siddiqui, Aafia’’s mother, a government post after he seized power in 1977 and set up a new court system to enforce sharia. The religious affairs minister Ijaz ul-Haq told The New Yorker that his family respected Aafia’s mother because she “is a religious scholar.” When ul-Haq’s own son attended college in Boston, Aafia Siddiqui fixed him home-cooked meals. Hopefully, if experience is a guide, we may learn that the Pakistan ISI had her in custody and treated her well — and that any questioners were respectful and merely subjected her to secondhand smoke.

An Interior Ministry spokesman confirmed in late May 2004 that Dr. Aafia Siddiqui, allegedly involved in terrorist activities, had been arrested in 2003 from Karachi and handed over to the US authorities. Just three days later on May 26, 2004, Director Mueller and Attorney General Ashcroft held a press conference announcing she was an Al Qaeda operative and they were looking for her (even though some were suggest the ISI or CIA already had her in custody for over a year). Aafia’s mother and sister at last report no longer communicated with the uncle who wrote an intriguing pair of letters to a Pakistan paper. The ACLU lawyer advised me that Aafia’s mom and sister deemed that his actions — in raising a fuss — were not in Aafia’s best interests.

Aafia has spent a lot of time in front of a keyboard and so she may have left quite a paper trail. Her mom said she had gone to Rawalpindi and elsewhere in Pakistan. Her mother blames her son-in-law but the FBI’s interest is greater in Aafia. When told by someone at the Roxbury mosque that the FBI did not know her as they knew her, the agent responded “You don’t know her like we know her.”

In the Fall of 2003, Fowzia left her position at John Hopkins in neurology to return to Pakistan. In the Spring, she inquired of a government official as to Aafia’s whereabouts and was told she had already been released and should go home and wait for a call — but the call never came. The Pakistan Interior Minister has said: “You will be astonished to know about the activities of Dr Aafia (Siddiqui).”

According to this report, Aafia was with her three children when detained. The family’s attorney denies that the three children are with relatives.

In 1995, Aafia wrote this:

“Pakistani govt. has officially joined the gang of our typical contemporary govts. of Muslim countries. I mean Egypt, Algeria, Tunisia and the likes of them… Here’s what I read in this Friday’s issue of the “Muslim News,” something that was confirmed a few days earlier by some articles in local papers like The Boston Globe and the New York Times etc: “BENAZIR ASKS FOR THE WEST’S HELP AGAINST ‘EXTREMISM’. Benazir Bhutto, Pakistan’s prime minister, called on the west to help eradicate religious opposition. She said that Pakistan is a “moderate” Islamic country and it is the first defense line against “terrorism,” and hence needs international support. She added that the arrest of Ramzi Yousef and giving him to the United States is a simple proof. [Ramzi Yousef was the mentor of al-Baluchi, Aafia’s future husband]. She added that Pressler’s amendment deprived Pakistan from U.S. aid and helped strengthen ‘religious violence.’”

“That was before she became a house frau,” the family’s ACLU attorney pointed out to me. But is it accurate to suggest that just because someone has primary responsibility for child care that they suddenly are no longer political?

Aafia’s sister Fowzia, a respected neurologist involved in diagnosing and treating epilepsy, was at John Hopkins until her concern for Aafia’s welfare became too pressing a matter. She too, along with her mom, for a time was locked inside the family home incommunicado even as to a distraught uncle. The Pakistan Interior Minister once said at a press conference: “You will be astonished to know about the activities of Dr Aafia (Siddiqui).” Her uncle wrote two informative letters to the editor at a Pakistan paper. His sister and niece were not under house arrest as he speculated — which leaves the inference they just didn’t hear the knocking at the door, weren’t at home, or just weren’t interested in communicating on the subject.

At last report in 2003, the ex-husband is alive and well in Karachi according to the ACLU attorney. At last report, Aafia’s mom, sister and brother reportedly did not know the whereabouts of Aafia’s children. The ACLU Attorney Lamoreaux advised me that she knows of no basis to the suggestion, first made by a Southern Florida television station, that Aafia knew “Jafar the Pilot.” (The civil rights attorney who represented Muhammad reports that although the Pakistan press has said she was a member of the “Chemical Wire Group,” Aafia in fact does not know anything about chemicals.)

In US News & World Report, attorney Lamoreaux is quoted as saying that Siddiqui doesn’t fit the profile. “A woman with children, wearing a hijab, driving a Volvo,” scoffs Lamoreaux. “Is that how al Qaeda is recruiting, now, at playgrounds?” The US News story noted “The FBI says the information from those early investigations is classified.” Lamoreaux adds: “The FBI often fans sparks into flames. But it looks to me like Khalid Shaikh Mohammed knew enough about her to know her name. It wasn’t Jane Doe or Jane Smith. That does strike me as odd.”

Did Aafia have potential access to the collection of anthrax strains at Brandeis and did that long-held collection include Ames? On March 11, 2002, the Brandeis General Counsel sent an email advising that the federal authorities had subpoenaed records in connection with the investigation of the anthrax crimes.

In November 2001, the Hazmat Team and the State Department of Health was called after three researchers were doing research with anthrax and Administration officials were concerned there might be contamination. The scientists were confident all scientific protocols had been followed but Hazmat was called nonetheless. The research had been done after the anthrax mailings seeking means to detect anthrax spores. The anthrax used had been at Brandeis a long time, acquired at a time before federal regulations in 1997 required that transfers be recorded. The lab was in the Kalman Building, part of the complex of buildings adjoining the Volen Center. Brandeis researchers Daniel Perlman and Inga Mahler had “decided to focus on developing a solid growth medium for cultivating B. anthracis that might be usable in the field with a minimum of equipment. They further developed the growth medium for use at room temperature thereby obviating the need for equipment such as incubators for sustaining an elevated temperature.” The pair obtained a patent issued March 2004 titled “Selective growth medium for Bacillus anthracis and methods of use.”

Dr. Perlman has been innovative on a wide range of consumer products; Dr. Mahler had published on the subject of gram positive and gram negative bacteria (the subject underlying the patent) in the Journal of Bacteriology in 1989. Dr. Mahler advises me that the strain of Bacillus anthracis they used in December 2001 was ordered by her group at Brandeis almost 40 years ago. It came from the American Type Culture Collection and was kept viable, together with other stock strains. She explains that before 9/11 you could simply obtain the organism from culture collections or colleagues. Their offices are in Abelson-Bass-Yalem, adjoining the Volen Center where Aafia’s lab was located. The strain used, Dr. Mahler advises (referred to in the paper as MC 607) — MC stands for Rosenstiel Center — was Vollum, not Ames. Vollum is a strain that like Ames is used to challenge vaccines. It is less lethal but was used by the US in the 1950s in making anthrax weapons. Dr. Mahler reports she knows of no Ames on campus. Dr. Perlman did not respond to an email query. The anthrax was autoclaved, or inactivated in a pressure cooker, before the inspectors arrived at the scene.
Aafia obtained her PhD from Brandeis in 2001, having graduated from MIT with a degree in biology in 1994. The Visual Lab at which Aafia worked had rules: “No Hitting, No Punching, No Pushing, No Grabbing, No Biting.” Judging from its internet page, the lab seems to have been a pleasant place to work. The operating manual instructed that if you don’t know “ask.” The lab’s work under Robert Sekuler, mainly funded by a grant from the NIH, related to how we remember, forget, or misremember things. Aafia’s 2001 183-page thesis “Separating the components of imitation,” which concerns visual learning and visual discrimination, was very far removed from questions like the Palestinian conflict or creating a fine powder using a mini-spraydryer.

In the first year of their Ph.D. program, students do 4 nine-week rotations in different laboratories of their choosing. First-year course work includes a core class in principles of neuroscience, and intensive graduate level seminars that give students experience in reading original research literature and making oral presentations. Graduate research advisors are typically chosen at the end of the first year. So one question is: what different labs did Aafia work in during her first year? It is related to the question: what is the origin of the anthrax spraydrying documents on the laptop of the colleague of Aafia’s future husband al-Balucchi?

“Aafia Siddiqui was here (Boston) in June 2001— when some press reports suggest she was in Liberia meeting with Atef — says the family’s attorney, Elaine Whitfield Sharp. “And I can prove it.” When her attorney proposed to the family that they obtain her credit card records by subpoena, the family vetoed the idea. Although it should have been easy to check, no members of a play group were brought forward to say that Aafia was in Boston in June. Counsel for the family succeeded at preventing Ismat, the mom, from having to testify before a grand jury in Boston on the grounds that she was too distraught over the disappearance of her daughter.

So what were the 4 labs (or whatever) that had the 8 known samples of Ames that were an identical match?

Did the PhD neurologist Aafia Siddiqui have potential access to the exact matching virulent Ames strain at the University of Texas Medical School at Houston? Veterinarian and anthrax expert Martin Hugh-Jones, a professor at Louisiana State University, has said: “It was like trading baseball cards.” Hugh-Jones reports he got most of his anthrax from Peter Turnbull at the Porton Down lab in Great Britain, one of those that had received the Ames strain directly from Ft. Detrick.

Aafia studied for a time in Houston for a year after moving to Houston in 1990. (Her brother lived and worked in the Houston area beginning in 2001). Did Aafia ever have contact with the Program in Neuroscience at the University of Texas Health Science Center? The program is at the Houston Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences where anthrax scientist Dr. Koehler is on the faculty. (Aafia was in the Brandeis Program in Neuroscience and her doctorate was in the neurological sciences.) The Program in Neuroscience is in Department of Neurobiology & Anatomy at 6431 Fannin Street.

Dr. Theresa M Koehler held a faculty appointment at the UT Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences. She was Associate Professor of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics. She has had grants from the CIA, the National Institutes of Health, and others for her work on virulence. Dr. Koehler’s address is 6431 Fannin, Houston — the same as the Program in Neuroscience. Her office was in the same complex, in the connected John Freeman Building. In Fall 2001, Dr. Koehler said she had taken the anthrax vaccine and that she got anthrax strains from Porton Down. In the Spring of 2003, Dr. Koehler explained that “It’s critical to use a genetically complete strain of the [anthrax] bacterium in experiments involving virulence.” A government study reported in April 2003 found that all of the labs that had received grants from the National Institutes of Health had unobstructed access to the floors with critical labs.

Ten million gallons of water were unleashed on the UT Medical School at Houston June 9, 2001 by Tropical Storm Allison. The basement, where the anthrax lab was located, was the hardest hit. More than 400 emergency personnel (internal and contracted) attempted to address the devastation. Throughout June, no equipment could be removed or powered up. Stairwell doors needed to be kept closed. By the first week of July 2001, the basement and ground floor was still off limits, and only one entrance was available. Ground floor occupants needed to continue to work at their temporary sites. Gross mold spore counts continued to be beyond acceptable limits in the basement, which was ventilated separately from the rest of the building.

The building was opened for business on July 11, 2001 but the ground floor and basement were construction remediation sites and off-limits except to access elevators to upper levels. Two entrances to the building were available: on the Webber Plaza side of the building near the circle drive and at the breezeway near the guard’s desk. Occupants were reminded in an employee newsletter not to block open stair well doors on any floor.

Did the anthrax lab in the basement have virulent Ames anthrax strain, to include Ames? (I don’t know of any indication and have no confirmation that they did). But if they did, what was done with the isolates during the devastation caused in the basement by the flood? At the time it was lawful to have virulent anthrax in its liquid form in a BL-2 facility, contrary to the occasional misperception; a hood is used in handling such isolates. A University President explained as much in a letter in connection with the incident when some live Ames spores were sent by Northern Arizona to Los Alamos in Fall 2001.

Members of the lab brought out the champagne at the lab in late 2001 when a special visa was granted to a research team member, who without it would have had to return to China. “We knew it was going to be risky,” said Dr. Koehler, a microbiologist at the school who for the past 20 years has studied the anthrax bacterium now being used as a terrorist weapon. “The question was whether current events would convince federal officials that [the researcher’s] skills are in the national interest or make them restrict workers from certain countries.”

“It is a horrible feeling to think that it could be someone I know, that the perpetrator is a microbiologist among us,” said Dr. Koehler. In September 2001, Dr. Koehler explained her anthrax research, how terrorists might deploy anthrax as a biological weapon and how physicians would treat it.

Aafia’s brother in 2001 was associated with addresses in Ann Arbor, Detroit, and Canton, Michigan — and even Harrison, NJ — in 2001, but there is no indication that Aafia visited him at those locations. Nor is there any indication she visited him in Houston when he and his family moved there in 2001. The ACLU attorney representing Aafia’s family advised me that it had been years since she was Houston — certainly before 2001 and maybe not since she was married. She added that if Aafia was there, it was to visit her brother, who has nothing to do with the med center.” The attorney reports: “there is no way they could have helped her get access to the necessary labs at the med center.” The attorney had no reason to know that among other things, that not only were the doors at Aafia’s old university building not locked, upon the massive flooding, they were propped open.

On Research Day in 2003, the award winners for Biomedical Excellence included a graduate student working in Dr. Koehler’s lab, Melissa Drysdale, who worked on gene regulation in a virulent strain of bacillus anthracis.

Dr. Koehler received, for example, the Weybridge strain from Porton Down prior to the Fall of 2001. Did Dr. Koehler have virulent Ames from either Porton Down or somewhere else? (Her mentor was the eminent vaccine researcher Dr. Curtis Thorne who got samples directly from Ft. Detrick).

Remember: Khalid Mohammed, who told authorities about Aafia, had anthrax production documents on his assistant’s laptop (the guy working with Aafia’s future husband in UAE in the summer of 2001). She allegedly was associated with both KSM and “Jafar the Pilot” who is at large. She later married an Al Qaeda operative al-Baluchi who, like al-Hawsawi, had been listed as a contact for the hijackers and took over plots upon the arrest of KSM. Authorities have said that a Pakistani scientist , who they refused to name was helping Al Qaeda with its anthrax production program. Were they referring to bacteriologist Abdul Qudus Khan in whose home the Pakistan authorities claim KSM was captured? Was it Rauf Ahmad who Zawahiri sent to infiltrate UK biodefense? Was it the chemistry professor who met with Uzair Paracha in February 2003? Or was it Aafia who was alleged to be a “facilitator” who handled logistics. “Logistics” is handling an operation that involves providing labor and materials as needed. According to a UN dossier reviewed by a journalist at the Wall Street Journal, in June 2001 she allegedly traveled to Liberia (I’m very skeptical) to meet Al Qaeda’s military commander, Atef, who had been head of the anthrax planning. A key to analysis is to determine whether the chauffeur who claims the lady was Aafia is lying or mistaken. A FBI memo from 2003 titled “Allegations Relating to al Qaeda’s Trafficking in Conflict Diamonds,” and a related 2004 presentation to the intelligence community, debunking the allegations relating to trafficking in conflict diamonds. The memo was declassified in 2006 and provided under FOIA in February 2008 to intelwire.com. If those documents represent the FBI’s current thinking, there is good reason to think Aafia never went to Liberia in June 2001.

The ACLU in a February 2004 publication called “Sanctioned Bias: Racial Profiling Since 9/11” described Aafia’s brother first encounter with the FBI. Muhammad A. Siddiqui is an architect in Houston and father of two young children. When his mom and sister called him to say the FBI had questioned him, he called ACLU attorney Annette Lamoreaux. It was a Monday evening when two FBI agents came to visit. “I’d be happy to talk to you, but I’d like to have my attorney present.” Borrowing a page from your favorite television show, one of the FBI agents suggested he didn’t need an attorney. He said that asking for an attorney only made him look guilty. The FBI agent again said that he wanted to speak to him now, greatly emphasizing the word “now.”

Following the advice of his civil rights attorney, he repeated: “I’d be happy to talk to you, but I’d like to have my attorney present.” In response to the FBI’s continuing pressure, he called Attorney Lamoreaux on his cell phone. She told the FBI agent that the agent could call her office during the day and set up an appointment. He screamed at Lamoreaux that Siddiqui did not have a right to counsel (as he was not in custody). Repeating her earlier suggestion that the agent call her on Monday, she told the agent “and you are to leave the house immediately.” The FBI agent handed the cell phone back to Siddiqui. Muhammad did not feel comfortable telling the agents to leave and so he kept politely repeating his attorney’s advice. “Turn off that cell phone!” the agent demanded.

Siddiqui reasonably refused, at least wanting to permit his attorney to serve as a witness to the questioning. From Siddiqui’s point of view, at least, the FBI agent pulled back his coat to reveal a gun. Siddiqui repeats that he was afraid — his children were inside and his wife, a busy doctor who worked at the local medical center, was not at home.

“I do this all the time. As soon as there is a lawyer in the picture, they have to play by the rules,” Lamoreaux explains.

The agents — thwarted — turned away. One of them said upon leaving: “We will talk to you. We are watching you. Don’t leave town.”

When the agent called on Monday, Attorney Lamoreaux suggested that they meet on Thursday when Siddiqui was free from work and child care responsibilities. The agent insisted on meeting that day and said he would stand outside of Siddiqui’s home until he came out and spoke to them. At the 15 minute meeting held that day at Lamoreaux’s office, the agent confirmed he had never been a criminal target. Mr. Siddiqui says, “Once there was counsel involved, attitudes changed dramatically. Laws started to mean something.”

Someone with the same common name, as mentioned in the court record relating to Project Bojinka. United States of America v. Ramzi Ahmed Yousef et al, (August 26, 1996), page 5118. A letter was read into the record
“To: Brother Mohammad Alsiddiqi. We are facing a lot of problems because of you. Fear Allah. Mr. Siddiqi, there is a day of judgment. You will be asked, if you are very busy with something more important, don’t give promises to other people. See you in the day of judgment. Still waiting, Khalid Shaikh, and Bojinka.”

In addition to many people having this very common name, people often used aliases. The attorney, Dietrich Snell, at the time was under the impression it related to a solicitation for money. Attorney Snell was from the US Attorney’s Office. More recently, Snell acted as counsel for the 9/11 Commission. He served as Deputy Attorney General for Public Advocacy under Eliot Spitzer. What was the address of the recipient? Who was Muhammad Siddiqui with whom KSM corresponded?

Attorney General Ashcroft and Director Mueller made an on-the-record renewed push to find Aafia Siddiqui in a press conference on May 26, 2004 shortly after ACLU Attorney Annette Lamoreaux responded to my emailed inquiries about Aafia. Three days after the Pakistan Ministry of Interior claimed she had been handed over to US authorities in late March 2003.

There are the many questions surrounding the mystery of the disappearance of the lovely, intelligent and pious Aafia Siddiqui. Aafia once had an MIT alumni email account forwarded to umaisha@yahoo.com — which under one translation means lively mom. Aisha was the Prophet’s favorite wife. Maybe correspondence in that email account held the answers.

In a Pakistan news account, Attorney Whitfield Sharp says she doesn’t know of any police report filed by the mom. In the same account, she reports that Aafia received job offer at both John Hopkins and the State University of New York (SUNY). It likely was SUNY downstate in Brooklyn where her sister had gone to school and lived. (Her mother Ismat is associated with addresses in Brooklyn, as well as Massachusetts, in Houston, and in Ann Arbor where Mohammad’s wife had a medical practice. Mohammad is associated with some Ann Arbor and Detroit-area addresses. Ann Arbor, coincidentally, was where IANA was located, as well as the President of Global Relief.

When he was captured, Al-Baluchi, Khalid Mohammed’s nephew and Aafia Siddiqui’s husband, “was in possession of a perfume spray bottle which contained a low concentration of cyanide when he was arrested.” He was the fellow who met with Majid Khan about using a textiles shipping container to smuggle an unidentified chemical into the country. Cyanide in perfume bottles had been suggested for use in nightclubs in Indonesia but Bin Laden reportedly nixed the plan as ineffectual.

The transcript from the Combatant Status Review Tribunal explains:

MEMBER [AL-BALUCHI]: While you were in Pakistan you describe the cyanide…
DETAINEE: [Interrupting the Member]
MEMBER: … you had in your possession, a small amount, as being textile, chemical-oriented.
DETAINEE: Yes.
MEMBER: Why would you have that on your person?
DETAINEE: Just I have. Wasn’t for specific purpose but I have. It’s ah…
MEMBER: Did you have an intent to use it once you got there? What were you going to do with it?
DETAINEE: No, no. Just ah, it’s use for clothing to remove the color. And something in Pakistan it’s something that they do. It’s bleach like kinda bleach but industrial bleach so.”

Now we are told that Aafia Siddiqui had a liquid poison on her. Well... maybe Attorney Sharp will explain that Aafia just did Al-Balucchi’s laundry.

According to the DOD formal charges issued in February 2008, KSM would give the hijackers a chemical in an eye dropper to remove Pakistan visas from their passport. Perhaps the low concentration of cyanide in the perfume bottle used to remove stains just related to that — rather than consideration of a plot to spray cyanide in a nightclub that had been vetoed by Bin Laden.

But here’s a Helpful Heloise Tip. Before attempting to get that damn spot out, first get rid of that incriminating pocket litter. The transcript from the hearing on al-Baluchi’s status as an “unlawful combatant” continues: “The Detainee’s pocket litter included a letter from unidentified Saudi Arabian scholars to Usama bin Laden. The letter discussed al Qaida’s strategy in the War on Terror.”

Aafia had info on bio, chem and radiological military assets, the usual (now cliched info on NYC landmarks, etc. These Al Qaeda operatives obviously have not taken to heart Ayman’s online book (in Arabic) on COVERT OPERATIONS.