Italy: Italian police yesterday arrested three alleged al-Qaeda operatives including a 30-year-old Algerian, identified as Sheikh Mahdjoub Abderrazak, believed to be a senior figure in the organisation responsible for sending "kamikaze" militants to Iraq, writes Paddy Agnew in Rome
Two of those arrested, a 33-year-old Tunisian, Mr Bouyahia Maher Ben Abdelaziz, and a 20-year-old Moroccan, Mr Housni Jamal, were picked up in Milan while Sheikh Abdelrrazk was apprehended in Hamburg by German police acting on an Italian warrant.
Two other alleged al-Qaeda operatives, a 33-year-old Iraqi, Mr Muhammad Majid, and a 42-year-old Tunisian woman, Ms Bentiwaa Farida Ben Bechir, for whom arrest warrants were also issued yesterday, remain at large, while a sixth warrant was served on a Tunisian, Mr Toumi Ali Ben Sassi, already in Italian custody.
Under legislation introduced in Italy after the September 11th, 2001, attacks, all six may be charged with "subversive association aimed at international terrorism".
In practice, this allows for preventive detention while charges are formulated.
Italian investigators have long been convinced that al-Qaeda operatives use Italy as a logistical, training and recruitment base for terrorist actions world-wide.
Yesterday's arrests are merely the latest in a series over the last two years which have been largely concentrated in northern Italy.
It is, however, possible that Sheikh Mahdjoub Abderrazak is the most senior al-Qaeda figure to be picked up in Italy since 9/11. Married to a German woman and father of two children, he is believed to be a senior recruitment figure, responsible for sending militants to both Kurdistan and Iraq.
According to Mr Guido Salvini, the magistrate who ordered Sheikh Abderrazak's arrest, there is every likelihood that the Algerian may have sent out militants involved in terrorist attacks in Casablanca and Jordan, as well as in more recent suicide-bomb attacks on an Italian military base in Nasiriya, southern Iraq, and on synagogues and British targets in Istanbul, Turkey.
Important information leading to yesterday's arrests was gleaned from suspected Islamic terrorists linked to the Ansar al Islam organisation, who were arrested in Italy last March.
Police also found numerous passport-size identity photos in the Milan apartment of Mr Ben Sassi, arrested on November 25th.
Among the photos were those of known "martyrs" killed in recent suicide attacks in Iraq.
Sheikh Abderrazak, who is believed to have been detained in Damascus, Syria, last March on his way to Iraq to fight against the US-led invasion force, was also arrested in July in Germany on charges of being involved in planning a terrorist attack on Spain's Costa del Sol.
He was subsequently released because of lack of sufficient evidence.
German police also report that Sheikh Abderrazak attended the Al-Quds mosque in Hamburg, which turned out to be a habitual meeting place for some of those involved in the attack on the US.