DRUGE (SIREN): Ashcroft says terrorist cell in Germany planned 9/11 attacks

Drudge ^

[hawaiian]

nothing follows yet...

[Lazamataz]

WASHINGTON –– A terrorist cell operating out of Hamburg, Germany, since at least 1999 included three of the hijackers and three accomplices who are being sought in connection with the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States, Attorney General John Ashcroft said Tuesday.

Ashcroft said the three fugitives, Said Bahaji, Ramsi Binalshibh and Zakariya Essabar, are sought for planning the attacks. German authorities previously issued international arrests warrants for the three.

"Their connections to the hijackers are extensive," said Ashcroft, appearing at a news conference with German Interior Minister Otto Schily. He identified the three hijackers as Mohamed Atta and Marwan Al-Shehhi, the suspected pilots of the hijacked planes that crashed into the World Trade Center in New York, and Ziad Jarrah, suspected of flying the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania.

[OWK]

CLICK HERE for text of article.

[Coyote]

Ashcroft: Attack Planned in Germany

By Karen Gullo
Associated Press Writer
Tuesday, Oct. 23, 2001; 12:17 p.m. EDT

WASHINGTON –– A terrorist cell operating out of Hamburg, Germany, since at least 1999 included three of the hijackers and three accomplices who are being sought in connection with the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States, Attorney General John Ashcroft said Tuesday.

Ashcroft said the three fugitives, Said Bahaji, Ramsi Binalshibh and Zakariya Essabar, are sought for planning the attacks. German authorities previously issued international arrests warrants for the three.

"Their connections to the hijackers are extensive," said Ashcroft, appearing at a news conference with German Interior Minister Otto Schily. He identified the three hijackers as Mohamed Atta and Marwan Al-Shehhi, the suspected pilots of the hijacked planes that crashed into the World Trade Center in New York, and Ziad Jarrah, suspected of flying the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania.

© Copyright 2001 The Associated Press

[ironwill]

Now is the time to bomb Germany! ;-P

[Tennessean4Bush]

Here is the link

[Dog Gone]

Thanks for the heads up, but why did you choose Politics/Elections as the story category?

[mlmr]

Wasn't there a story posted on FR earlier about a moving truck and some Arab men and a German woman? I cannot remember the details but I thought the police let the woman go.

[Wright is right!]

All this story does is FIRM UP what they've already told us. We've seen the apartments in Hamburg on the news, we knew of the connections, this story just says "we've now cemented those details in place."

Don't think I would have given this one a siren. Too much of it was already known.

Michael

[doug from upland]

Wait, didn't Sandy Berger say it had only been planned for a few months? We can't blame Scumbag for this, can we?

[umbra]

Was it in Michigan?

[Blacksheep]

How come we don't have pictures of these guys!!!!!!!!

[MarkWar]

>Ashcroft says terrorist cell in Germany planned 9/11 attacks

I'm sure it's just a coincidence, but isn't Germany where all our Cipro comes from?

Mark W.

[Righty1]

You know that you can only release pics of white male suspects. When the Anthrax debacle is finally pinned on the ME I want some heads including Pat Robertson's.

[riri]

I lived about an hour south of Hamburg last year. The Arab/Muslim/Middle Eastern population is so thick, I don´t think I can convey to you. I was always told many are Turks or Iraqis that seek political asylum through Turkey.

[ex-snook]

Guess that means Kristol and the Neo-con war mongers will want to bomb Germany back to the stone age or perhaps Kristol's rage only apply to camel countries who are already pretty stone age.

[Oldeconomybuyer]

10-23) 09:33 PDT (AP) --

Ashcroft said the three hijackers were roommates in Hamburg while attending school there in the 1990s. He said Binalshibh and Atta started a Muslim prayer group in Hamburg and Essabar went to Florida in February at a time when both Atta and al-Shehhi were known to be there. And Essabar, Jarrah and al-Shehhi all appeared in a video of Bahaji's wedding, he said.

"It is clear that Hamburg served as a central base of operations for these six individuals and their part in the planning of the Sept. 11 attack," Ashcroft said.

Ashcroft said 12 FBI agents have been assigned to various locations in Germany to assist in the investigation.

"We must say we failed to see it" beforehand, Schily, the German minister, said of the attacks on New York and Washington. "But to be very open-minded" about it, "we altogether failed. ... We have to re-examine our security system."

Schily said Monday that foreign exchange companies that operate globally could have been used by terrorists. He would not name specific companies but urged money exchange firms to cooperate.

[MarkWar]

>Wasn't there a story posted on FR earlier about a moving truck and some Arab men and a German woman? I cannot remember the details but I thought the police let the woman go.

Yes. The thrust of the story was that the terrorists had been caught with video of the Sears Tower in Chicago. (If I remember right, the German woman also had medication in someone else's name -- but they didn't specify what the medication was.)

I just did a search on Sears Tower and didn't get the thread. I don't remember what the key words were. Anybody remember?

Mark W.