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Six Moroccans suspected in Madrid blasts
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-03-17 08:48 Police reportedly now suspect at least six
Moroccans took part in the Madrid train bombings, and the United States is
assisting a growing international investigation that is increasingly focused on
Islamic militants possibly linked to al-Qaeda.
A 45-year-old woman died of her injuries Tuesday, raising the death toll from
Thursday's bombings to 201. Of the more than 1,600 wounded, eight are in
critical condition.
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| One of the detained suspects, centre
hooded, alleged to be connected to the train bomb attacks in Madrid last
March 11 is seen outside the Nuevo Siglo telephone calling centre in
Madrid Tuesday March 16, 2004 accompanied by two plain clothed police
officers. [AP] | Cardinal Antonio Rouco
Varela led a Mass at Madrid's cathedral Tuesday night remembering the victims of
the bloodiest terrorist attack in Spain's history.
"The tragic attacks of March 11 have sunk us all into deep pain," intoned
Varela, a huge black ribbon hanging from a wall above the altar. "To kill your
own kind, to kill a brother, is to attack God himself."
The main suspect in custody in the attacks, Moroccan immigrant Jamal Zougam,
has already been identified by Spanish Judge Baltasar Garzon as a follower of
Imad Yarkas, the alleged leader of Spain's al-Qaeda cell who is jailed on
suspicion he helped plan the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.
The daily newspaper El Pais reported Tuesday that police
believe they have identified five other Moroccans who directly participated in
the attacks and are at large. Spain's Interior Ministry refused comment.
Two people who were traveling on one of the attacked trains have said that
Zougam was aboard just before the bombs began exploding, El Pais said.
With signs that the bombings were carried out by Islamic extremists who
operate and have confederates in several countries, FBI agents are helping
Spanish police in using fingerprints and names to seek a full picture of Zougam
and four other suspects in custody, a senior U.S. law enforcement official said
in Washington.
Spanish police have also arrested two more Moroccans and two Indians, but
their possible role in the attacks has not been specified. European countries
were searching their databases for any information pertinent to the attack.
A U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said "it's increasingly
likely Islamic extremists were involved in these attacks. In terms of assigning
responsibility, it isn't clear."
"It's not clear who these groups were," the official said, referring to
whether they had links to al-Qaeda and other extremist groups or even to the
Basque separatist group ETA.
A suspected link between the Madrid bombings and suicide bomb attacks in
Casablanca, Morocco, last year grew stronger Tuesday when French private
investigator Jean-Charles Brisard described a phone tap in which Zougam said he
had met with Mohamed Fizazi, the spiritual leader of Salafia Jihadia, a
clandestine Moroccan extremist group.
Salafia Jihadia is suspected of involvement in the Casablanca attack, which
killed 33 people and 12 bombers and has been linked to Osama bin Laden's
al-Qaeda terror network.
Brisard told The Associated Press the tapped call is cited in a lengthy
report written for Garzon's inquiry of the Sept. 11 attacks. Brisard, who is
helping investigate the Sept. 11 attacks for lawyers representing some victims'
families, has a copy of the report.
The Garzon document says that in the August 2001 monitored phone call, Zougam
told Yarkas: "On Friday, I went to see Fizazi and I told him that if he needed
money we could help him with our brothers," Brisard said.
Fizazi was among 87 people sentenced in Morocco in August in a trial that
centered on the Casablanca attacks. Fizazi received a 30-year sentence after
being convicted of preaching radical Islam in mosques and meeting with the
Casablanca attack's perpetrators.
Police in the Basque city of San Sebastian, meanwhile, said they detained an
Algerian who allegedly talked about a terrorist attack in Madrid two months
before it happened.
Ali Amrous, an apparent indigent, was picked up Monday to learn if he had
advance knowledge of the attacks, police said. He was first arrested in January
after a neighborhood disturbance and while being questioned told police, "We
will fill Madrid with the dead," according to authorities.
He was expected to be brought to Madrid for questioning. Police said they did
not believe Amrous had any contacts with ETA, which the government initially
blamed for the attacks.
Authorities have been tracking Islamic extremist activity in Spain since the
mid-1990s and say it was an important staging ground, along with Germany, for
the Sept. 11 attacks.
The Madrid attacks are now one death short of the 202 killed in October 2002
in the nightclub bombing in Bali — blamed on an al-Qaeda-linked group — which
was the deadliest terror attack since Sept. 11, 2001.
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