Free Republic

A SUSPECTED al Qaeda leader, accused of being involved in September 11 and planning the 2004 Madrid train bombings, has been imprisoned in a secret US jail for the past year, Spain's El Pais newspaper reported today. Mustafa Setmarian, 48, a Syrian with Spanish citizenship, was captured in Pakistan in October 2005 and is held in a prison operated by the US Central Intelligence Agency, Pakistani and European security service officials told El Pais. A spokesman for the US embassy in Spain declined to comment on the report. Setmarian's 2005 capture was reported in May of this year after the...

Mustafa Setmarian Nasar has been linked to the March 2004 Madrid train bombings which killed almost 200 people. MADRID, Spain (CNN) -- Spanish officials have downplayed British press reports that a Syrian-born Spaniard -- Mustafa Setmarian Nasar -- who is linked to al Qaeda activities and the Madrid train bombings, was also behind the London bombings last week. "That is not a fact that has been even minimally confirmed," Spain's secretary of state for security, Antonio Camacho, said at a public appearance in the town of El Escorial, near Madrid, on Monday. "The English authorities have not transmitted that to...