Man Charged as Bomb Plot Mastermind

NEW YORK —  A London-based Algerian has been arrested and charged by U.S. authorities with being one of the masterminds of a plot by Islamic terrorists to bomb Los Angeles International Airport on the eve of the millennium, federal officials said Sunday.

Authorities also have linked the man, Abu Doha, to an alleged conspirator in a second millennium terrorist plot to detonate bombs at several sites in Jordan often visited by American and Israeli tourists, according to an affidavit by an FBI agent filed in support of Doha’s arrest.

Doha, who was already in custody in London on immigration violations, was charged in a sealed criminal complaint July 2 with conspiring to use a weapon of mass destruction to blow up an LAX terminal just before New Year’s Day 2000 as part of a jihad, or holy war, against the United States.

The arrest warrant for Doha and the charges against him were confirmed Sunday by David N. Kelley, chief of the Organized Crime and Terrorism section of the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan. He said extradition efforts are underway to get Doha to the United States, where he faces life in prison if convicted of the charges.

Doha emerged as a key figure in the LAX plot over the last few weeks, when convicted terrorist Ahmed Ressam told federal authorities that he received “instruction” from Doha when planning the attack.

More details of Doha’s alleged role in the plot emerged Sunday in the affidavit filed in support of his arrest.

The affidavit, filed by FBI Special Agent Michael Butsch, said Ressam and Doha were in contact frequently about the LAX plot while in a terrorist training camp in Afghanistan, and when Ressam went to Montreal to carry out the plot in late 1999 and Doha went to London. From London, Doha helped Ressam in planning the attack on LAX and in providing escape routes to Europe and North Africa for those who were to participate, according to the affidavit.

The plot was foiled when Ressam was caught trying to enter Washington state from Canada on Dec. 14, 1999, in a car loaded with explosive components and four handmade timing devices.

According to Butsch, Doha also played a large role in a global terrorist network, acting as a liaison between terrorist training camps financed and operated by Saudi militant Osama Bin Laden and jihad cells around the world.

Doha facilitated the travel of terrorist “trainees into the camps as well as their entry into and out of countries in which various terrorist ‘operations’ were to take, or had taken, place,” according to Butsch’s affidavit.

The affidavit did not provide details, but said Butsch based his assessment of Doha’s role on information provided by Ressam.

Doha was identified in a Los Angeles Times story last week as a central figure in an emerging network of North African terrorists in Europe and North America. The terrorists are taught guerrilla warfare in jihad training camps in Afghanistan financed by Bin Laden, but then operate independently.

Intelligence officials here and in Europe are investigating whether Doha is linked to North African terrorist cells in London; Frankfurt, Germany; and Milan, Italy; and at least one plot to bomb Western targets in Strasbourg, France, late last year, The Times story also reported.

Doha and Ressam trained together in an Afghanistan camp during much of 1998, learning how to terrorize the United States through urban warfare, explosives and political assassination, according to testimony in court by Ressam.

He was testifying in the case of Mokhtar Haouari, a former friend in Montreal who was convicted Friday of conspiring to provide support to Ressam as part of the LAX plot.

The federal jury found Haouari, 32, guilty of supplying Ressam with a fake Canadian driver’s license and $3,000 to carry out the airport attack.

Ressam, 34, became the government’s star witness against Haouari in exchange for leniency, following his own conviction in federal court on terrorism charges that could put him in prison for 140 years.

As part of his plea agreement, Ressam also pledged to give authorities as many details as he could about the international network of jihad terrorists, including those in the Bin Laden camps and in Europe, Canada and the United States.

Ressam has spent at least 14 marathon debriefing sessions with authorities, and has given them a substantial amount of information they are using to track down suspects in the LAX and other cases, sources have told The Times.