Free Republic

MADRID A Saudi cleric funneled money to an Egyptian suspected of being one of the masterminds of the Madrid train bombings in March, Spanish and Italian newspapers reported Thursday. The Egyptian suspect, Rabei Osman Ahmed, arrested in Milan in June on a request from the Spanish authorities, identified Sheik Salman al-Awdah, a former university professor in Saudi Arabia, as his financier while he was living in Spain between 2001 and 2003, El Mundo of Spain and Corriere della Sera of Italy said in a joint report. The March 11 train bombings killed 191 people and have been attributed to Islamic...

Two men suspected of Islamic terrorist links arrested this week in Spain were arrested near a nuclear-powered electricity-generating plant, authorities said. Officials in the central region of Guadalajara said on 30 September that a police patrol stopped and briefly questioned Moroccan Mohamed El Ouazzani and Moroccan-born Khalid Zeimi Pardo close to the Zorita nuclear power plant. The men were asked for their papers at the time, and after it was confirmed that they were in the country legally and had no criminal records, were let go. Ouazzani and Zeimi Pardo were among five men arrested Tuesday in three Spanish cities...

MILAN (Reuters) - A group of suspected Islamic militants arrested in Italy and Belgium may have been planning an attack on NATO headquarters or the European Parliament, Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera said on Wednesday. Quoting Italian investigators, Corriere said a suspected planner of the Madrid bombings in March -- among those arrested on Tuesday -- had intended to travel from Italy to Belgium possibly to take part in an attack on a "symbolic" target. Rabei Osman Sayed Ahmed, known as "Mohamed the Egyptian," was seized on Tuesday with a fellow suspect in Milan, and Belgian police, acting on information...