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Tape claims al-Qaida tied to Spain blasts
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-03-14 09:11
In a videotaped message, a man purporting to represent al-Qaida claims the
terrorist network was behind bombings that killed 200 and wounded 1,500 in
Madrid, the Spanish interior minister said Saturday.
A man shows a
banner reading "WHO MADE IT?" in front a Popular Party (PP) in central
Barcelona, Spain, March 13, 2004. After the Spanish Interior Minister
Angel Acebes announced that three Moroccans and two Indians were arrested
March 13, 2004 in Madrid as part of the investigations into train bombings
that killed 200 people March 11, 2004.
[Reuters] | The tape — along with the arrest of
three Moroccan and two Indian suspects — provide the strongest indication yet of
a possible Islamic link to the attack on one of Washington's staunchest allies
in Iraq. The Spanish government, however, said it could not confirm the tape's
authenticity.
The announcement by Interior Minister Angel Acebes came just hours before
polls were to open Sunday in general elections weighed down by debate over who
carried out the attack.
"We declare our responsibility for what happened in Madrid exactly 2 1/2
years after the attacks on New York and Washington," said the man, according to
a government translation of the tape, which was recorded in Arabic. "It is a
response to your collaboration with the criminals Bush and his allies."
Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar has been a staunch supporter of the U.S.-led
war in Iraq.
A London-based Arabic newspaper had earlier received a claim of
responsibility in al-Qaida's name; but the government has been reluctant to
blame the Islamic group, saying the Basque separatist group ETA was also a
suspect. ETA denied responsibility.
Speaking at a hastily called post-midnight news conference at the interior
ministry, Acebes said authorities could not confirm the claim was genuine. He
said the videotape was discovered after an Arabic-speaking man called a Madrid
TV station and said where it could be found.
A statement from the ministry said the speaker was identified as Abu Dujan al
Afghani. Acebes said he claimed to be the military spokesman of Al-Qaida in
Europe, but said he was not known to law enforcement authorities in Spain, and
that they were checking the tape's authenticity.
The man threatened further attacks in the video.
"This is a response to the crimes that you caused in the world, and
specifically in Iraq and Afghanistan, and there will be more if God wills it,"
the man said, according to the Spanish government's translation.
Thursday's attacks in Madrid came just days before Sunday's general elections
in Spain. At demonstrations Saturday, some protesters said they believed the
ruling party was playing down the possible link between the bombings and Spain's
role in Iraq, fearing it would hurt the party's chances in the election.
About 5,000 people protested Saturday outside the ruling party headquarters
in Madrid, holding up signs saying "no more cover-up."
One banner read: "Aznar, because of you we all pay."
"Maybe now the truth will come out," Fernando Hernandez, a college student,
said after hearing about the arrests. "All we want is the truth."
Earlier Saturday, Acebes said the five suspects were arrested around Madrid.
A spokesman for the Moroccan government identified the three Moroccans as as
Jamal Zougam, 30; Mohamed Bekkali, 31, a mechanic; and Mohamed Chaoui, 34. All
three are from northern Morocco, but the government gave no further details
about them.
"One might have connections with Moroccan extremist groups. But it is still
very early to establish to what degree," Acebes said. He did not name any group.
The five suspects were arrested after a gym bag packed with explosives and a
cell phone was discovered on one of the four bombed rush-hour trains, the
minister said. The attacks killed 200 people and injured 1,500.
Two Spaniards of Indian origin also were called for questioning but are not
expected to be arrested, Acebes said.
Spanish citizens were among 33 people killed by suicide bombings that
targeted Jewish targets and a Spanish restaurant close to the Spanish consulate
in Casablanca, Morocco in May 2003.
Those attacks were blamed on Salafia Jihadia, a secretive, radical Islamic
group thought by Moroccan authorities to have links to al-Qaida. Twelve suicide
bombers also died.
Just months ago, a taped threat thought to be from al-Qaida terror chief
Osama bin Laden had included Spain among countries that could be attacked "at
the appropriate time and place."
A confirmed Islamic extremist involvement in the Madrid bombings could play
into the hands of Aznar critics who opposed sending 1,300 peacekeepers to Iraq.
"If it was al-Qaida, this was a reprisal for sending troops to Iraq, where we
have no business being," said Damian Garcia, whose 86-year-old father died in
the bombings.
The government had sought to dampen such speculation. Acebes said earlier
Saturday that autopsies conducted on victims showed no signs of suicide bombings
— a hallmark of Islamic militants.
Pressure mounted for answers. The crowd outside the Popular Party
headquarters chanted, "We want the truth before voting."
Aznar's hand-picked candidate to succeed him, Mariano Rajoy, charged that the
rally violated a law banning political demonstrations on the day before an
election.
"I hereby demand that the organizers of this illegal demonstration end this
antidemocratic act of pressure against tomorrow's elections," he said.
Hours earlier, the opposition Socialists charged that Rajoy himself violated
the law by urging voters in a newspaper interview Saturday to give an absolute
majority in Parliament.
Rajoy was only 3-5 percentage points ahead of Socialist candidate Jose Luis
Rodriguez Zapatero before opinion polls were stopped before the blasts in the
last week of campaigning.
The massive police hunt for the bombers focused in part on a stolen van found
with seven detonators and an audiotape of verses from the Quran. A witness told
Associated Press Television News he saw three suspicious men go from the vehicle
to a station where three of the four bombed trains originated.
The men wore coverings on their faces but "it wasn't cold ... I thought it
was very strange," said the man, who did not want to be named. "They went into
the train station ... I tried to follow one of them but I couldn't because he
was very fast."
The attack's lethal coordination — 10 explosions within 15 minutes — pointed
to al-Qaida.
The compressed dynamite used in the attacks, however, is favored by ETA,
which has killed more than 800 people in four decades of bombings and
assassinations to carve out an independent Basque homeland in northern Spain.
ETA attacks have never been as deadly as the Madrid bombings and mostly
targeted police and politicians. On Friday, a caller claiming to represent ETA
told a Basque newspaper it was not responsible — the first time ETA is known to
have denied an attack.
The death of a man in a hospital overnight pushed the toll up to 200
Saturday. Of the 1,511 injured, 266 remained hospitalized — with 17 in critical
condition.
Since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States, only the Bali bombing
in Indonesia in October 2002 was deadlier, with 202 people dead. The Madrid
attack was Europe's deadliest since the 1988 bombing of a Pan Am jetliner over
Lockerbie, Scotland, killed 270 people.
A steady stream of hearses carried coffins in and out of Madrid's biggest
funeral home, Tanatorio Sur. The sprawling red-brick building normally has
plenty of room, but was still overwhelmed Saturday. For lack of space, the
coffins of a couple killed in the attacks were placed in a room normally used
for staff meetings.
"My son. Why?" repeatedly sobbed one elderly woman, leaning on
relatives.
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