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Al-Qaeda at home in Europe
By Kathleen Ridolfo
A group calling itself the al-Qaeda of Jihad in Europe has claimed
responsibility for the July 7 attacks on the London transport system that left
at least 37 dead and hundreds wounded, according to a statement posted on the
Internet.
The group called its attacks "a blessed raid", adding: "We have repeatedly
warned the British government and people. We have fulfilled our promise and
carried out our blessed military raid in Britain after our mujahideen exerted
strenuous efforts over a long period of time to ensure the success of the
raid."
The statement warned the governments of Italy and Denmark "and all the crusader
governments" that they would be punished if they do not withdraw their troops
from Iraq and Afghanistan. The attacks may be retaliation for a crackdown by
European states, including the United Kingdom, in recent months against Islamic
militants.
The attacks are reminiscent of the Madrid train bombings carried out by an
al-Qaeda-affiliated group on March 11, 2004 in retaliation for Spain's
participation in coalition forces in Iraq. Those attacks left 191 people dead
and prompted Spain to pull out of Iraq.
'Homegrown' terrorist networks
The extent of the presence of al-Qaeda and its affiliated groups in Europe has
come to light in recent months after a series of arrests and investigations in
Germany, France, Great Britain, Italy, Spain and the Netherlands. The success
of such networks lies in the fact that they are "homegrown", operated by
Muslims living in European states who know the terrain and possess European
passports that enable them to move easily throughout Europe and the Middle
East. A number of jihadi websites supporting al-Qaeda have reportedly boasted
about the group's European martyrs in Iraq in recent weeks, and Iraq-based
terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has appealed to Muslims in Europe to join
al-Qaeda.
Many of the suspected terrorist leaders in Europe gained experience in
Afghanistan in the 1990s, while others may be new recruits bent on seeking what
they see as justice against the United States and its allies for a whole range
of transgressions - be they economic or political - but most notably for the
multinational operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. Terrorist networks across
Europe that were reportedly dormant have been reactivated in the past six
months, making Europe a major center for recruiting suicide bombers - ahead of
the Middle East, North Africa, and Asia, London's The Observer reported on June
19.
The report cited unidentified intelligence sources as saying that up to 21
networks were active in Europe, some of which were linked to over 60 groups in
North Africa - not surprising since the majority of Muslim immigrants to Europe
come from the North African states of Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia. The
networks are responsible for training and recruiting volunteers, particularly
for jihadi operations in Iraq, the report contended.
A May 17 statement by German Interior Minister Otto Schily cited Islamist
extremism and terrorism as the "greatest threat" to national security. Schily
cited the 2004 "Protection of the Constitution Report" as saying the number of
"members and followers" of Islamist organizations in Germany was 31,800, with
the number of "potentially extremist foreigners" in Germany at approximately
57,500. The statement did not allude to the classification guidelines that
produced those numbers.
Schily added in his statement that 171 preliminary proceedings had been
initiated in Germany against suspected Islamist militants, including one person
arrested on January 24 who was suspected of taking part in al-Qaeda training
camps in Afghanistan "on several occasions". That person admitted to having
been instructed by al-Qaeda to recruit suicide assassins in Europe.
Since December, at least 30 people have been arrested in Germany for their
alleged role in Islamist terror networks, including at least six members of
Ansar al-Islam, the Iraq-based group that grew into the Ansar al-Sunnah Army,
which is affiliated with Zarqawi's Tanzim Qaidat al-Jihad fi Bilad al-Rafidayn.
Ansar al-Islam's founder and spiritual leader, Mullah Krekar, has been living
in Norway since 1991.
Members of Ansar al-Islam-affiliated groups have also been arrested in France
in recent weeks. Seven people were arrested on June 21 as part of a French
judicial investigation into networks that recruit and provide logistical
support to al-Qaeda in Iraq. The arrests marked the fourth operation this year
by French intelligence against Islamist networks operating in support of
militants in Iraq.
Meanwhile, the Algerian Salafi Group for Preaching and Combat has reportedly
formed an alliance with Zarqawi's group to target French nationals in Iraq and
worldwide, London's al-Sharq al-Awsat reported on July 3. The Algerian group
was targeting France for "supporting the Algerian regime", the newspaper
reported.
In one recent UK operation against homegrown terror, police arrested a man in
Manchester in late June on suspicion that he was recruiting suicide bombers in
Britain to attack multinational forces in Iraq. The threat to Britain was
well-known after September 11, when intelligence indicated the presence of a
number of radical groups in the country who recruited British Muslims through
various means, including English-language propaganda and the establishment of
"study cells" on university campuses, Jane's Intelligence Digest noted.
Britain is also home to a number of Islamist publications and websites,
including Islamic Renewal Organization - a website forum run by Saudi
national Muhammad al-Ma'sari, which regularly posts statements for al-Qaeda.
Failure to anticipate new groups
European governments largely ignored the threat of terrorism on their soil
before the Madrid attacks, and security analysts have said that European laws
and outdated intelligence-gathering procedures have worked to the detriment of
law-enforcement agencies, which operate under guidelines different from those
in the United States.
For example, European law-enforcement, security and intelligence services after
September 11 continued to target only known terrorist cells. The intelligence
apparatuses in Europe failed, however, to address the growing number of
associated groups or support cells that provided assistance to al-Qaeda in
terms of recruitment and financial transfers. It was considered politically
incorrect to revise the legislative framework to target several hundred
terrorist-support cells active on European soil.
In addition, European states in the post-September 11 environment did not take
the terrorism threat seriously. In the two-and-a-half years since September 11,
al-Qaeda had carried out only one terrorist attack a year, while groups
associated with al-Qaeda had carried out four times that number - on average,
one attack every three months.
Lack of law-enforcement tools
Security analysts have said that Europe will continue to be hindered in its
fight on terror as long as insufficient laws remain in place that inhibit the
investigation of terrorist activities. France's top antiterrorism judge,
Jean-Louis Bruguiere, told BBC Radio 4 in a May 31 interview that practices
such as wire-tapping needed to be legalized in Britain. "We have a lot of legal
means you [Great Britain] don't have and these legal means allow us to control
and possibly prevent terrorist activities," he said.
He added that terrorists could easily enter the UK from France or continental
Europe with false papers. "If you don't have this possibility to have a
database, to know exactly and to control individuals who would be suspected to
use false papers in terrorist activities, you miss things," he said, suggesting
France's compulsory identification-card system has helped stem attacks there.
Copyright (c) 2005, RFE/RL Inc. Reprinted with the permission of
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty,
1201 Connecticut Ave NW, Washington DC 20036 |
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