FROM: http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/reuters/100621/us/usreport_us_timessquare
NEW YORK (Reuters) - The man accused of trying to set off a car bomb in New York's Times Square on May 1 pleaded guilty on Monday to terrorism-related charges.
Pakistani-born Faisal Shahzad, who became a U.S. citizen last year, was indicted in Manhattan federal court on Thursday on 10 charges, including attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction and attempted terrorism transcending national borders.
Shahzad, 30, is accused of parking a vehicle containing a crude car bomb in Times Square in Midtown Manhattan. He was arrested aboard a Dubai-bound jetliner two days later that was minutes from leaving New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport.
Showing posts with label time square bomber. Show all posts
Showing posts with label time square bomber. Show all posts
Monday, June 21, 2010
Friday, May 28, 2010
FAMILIES OF TIME SQUARE BOMBER DEFEND SUSPECTS
*** Of course they do. In fact, one of the most common reactions from people is, 'but he seemed so nice!'. Another note for Jihadi wannabe's: your family suffers because of YOUR actions - why put them through all this? Trust me - the Muslim bond is not as strong as you think: no one will help you for your legal bills, medical bills they will not even follow through with FOOD for your kid(s) that you left behind. Look before you leap. MS ***
FROM: http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/100528/world/as_pakistan_times_square
When Pakistani intelligence agents probing the botched Times Square car bombing dragged Humbal Akhtar from his house, his wife grabbed his arm in desperation. "What has he done wrong?" Rahila Akhtar screamed before they took him away.
She didn't get an answer, and still hasn't nearly two weeks later. She has heard nothing of his fate, or whether he's even accused of a crime.
"He is a simple, honest and loving person," she said between tears Friday in a telephone interview with The Associated Press. "I don't know where to go to find him and I have no idea where is he being held. But now I am driving alone on roads and looking for my husband."
Under American pressure, Pakistan has rounded up at least 11 people since the attempted attack May 1 in New York City. An intelligence official has alleged two of them played a role in plot, but gave few details. No one has been charged.
The detentions are angering the men's families, as well as human rights activists in Pakistan who have long campaigned against such actions by the country's powerful and largely unaccountable intelligence agencies.
The families of five of the detained men have told The Associated Press they knew the main suspect detained in the United States, Pakistani-American Faisal Shahzad, or others held in connection with him, but insist they are innocent.
Most come from the same stock as Shahzad — wealthy, urban, educated and with careers such as computers, telecommunications and graphic design. Several are observant Muslims and had expressed anti-American sentiments, but that combination is common in Pakistan.
One of three men arrested in the U.S. and accused of supplying money to Shahzad was ordered to be deported to his native Pakistan by a U.S. immigration judge Thursday. Aftab Khan has said he never heard of Shahzad before his May 13 arrest, but federal authorities allege he had Shahzad's name in his cellphone and written on an envelope.
Detentions by Pakistani intelligence agencies are typically never confirmed by government officials or security forces. People can be held for months or years without charge, in clear violation of Pakistani law.
Human rights groups allege that torture while in detention is common. Several people arrested by the intelligence agencies in Pakistan after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks were given to the United States and their families were not informed.
"Whoever captured my son is a terrorist," said Rana Ashraf Khan, whose son, Salman Ashraf, was detained while driving to work. "I am extremely worried about his safety."
The catering company Khan runs with with his son was accused of possible terrorist links by the U.S. Embassy when news of his detention broke.
U.S. officials have accused Shahzad of working with the Pakistani Taliban to organize the car bomb, a rudimentary device that failed to explode. Shahzad was arrested two days after the bombing attempt as he tried to fly out of the United States on a jetliner bound for the Middle East.
Seven people are known to have been detained in Islamabad and Rawalpindi. Officials have said four others were picked up in the southern city of Karachi, several of whom had links to a mosque there run by Jaish-e-Mohammad, a militant group with connections to al-Qaida. It is not clear whether any have since been released.
An intelligence official has identified one of those detained — Shoaib Mughal — as a go-between for Shahzad and the Pakistani Taliban in their hide-outs close the Afghan border. He was running a large computer dealership in Islamabad before his detention.
The other suspect alleged to have had some kind of involvement in the plot, identified only by his first name, Shahid, is alleged to have helped arrange money for Shahzad, but it is unclear what for.
Rahila Akhtar said around 20 intelligence agents and police officers came for her husband in the heat of mid-afternoon on May 17, jumping over the gate and banging on the door of their house. They asked for Humbal and started dragging him away.
"On seeing that, I was shocked and I started weeping, and I tightly held my husband's arm and said, 'I am not going to allow you to take him away,'" she said. She said officers told her not to make a scene.
They asked about her and Humbal, 35, and where his mobile phone was.
She went inside to get the phone, but when she returned Humbal was gone. She said hours later she received a telephone call from someone who did not give his name, assuring her that her husband would be safe.
Rahila Akhtar said her husband graduated from a private university in Islamabad and worked briefly for the government before starting a graphic design business. She said he worked from home to help her raise their three children, all under 5.
Pakistan's Human Rights Commission said it was investigating the detentions.
"No one should be arrested without prima facie evidence. They should be produced in court and their family should be informed," said I.A. Rehman, a leader of the commission. "Whatever agencies may be involved, the law must be followed."
FROM: http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/100528/world/as_pakistan_times_square
When Pakistani intelligence agents probing the botched Times Square car bombing dragged Humbal Akhtar from his house, his wife grabbed his arm in desperation. "What has he done wrong?" Rahila Akhtar screamed before they took him away.
She didn't get an answer, and still hasn't nearly two weeks later. She has heard nothing of his fate, or whether he's even accused of a crime.
"He is a simple, honest and loving person," she said between tears Friday in a telephone interview with The Associated Press. "I don't know where to go to find him and I have no idea where is he being held. But now I am driving alone on roads and looking for my husband."
Under American pressure, Pakistan has rounded up at least 11 people since the attempted attack May 1 in New York City. An intelligence official has alleged two of them played a role in plot, but gave few details. No one has been charged.
The detentions are angering the men's families, as well as human rights activists in Pakistan who have long campaigned against such actions by the country's powerful and largely unaccountable intelligence agencies.
The families of five of the detained men have told The Associated Press they knew the main suspect detained in the United States, Pakistani-American Faisal Shahzad, or others held in connection with him, but insist they are innocent.
Most come from the same stock as Shahzad — wealthy, urban, educated and with careers such as computers, telecommunications and graphic design. Several are observant Muslims and had expressed anti-American sentiments, but that combination is common in Pakistan.
One of three men arrested in the U.S. and accused of supplying money to Shahzad was ordered to be deported to his native Pakistan by a U.S. immigration judge Thursday. Aftab Khan has said he never heard of Shahzad before his May 13 arrest, but federal authorities allege he had Shahzad's name in his cellphone and written on an envelope.
Detentions by Pakistani intelligence agencies are typically never confirmed by government officials or security forces. People can be held for months or years without charge, in clear violation of Pakistani law.
Human rights groups allege that torture while in detention is common. Several people arrested by the intelligence agencies in Pakistan after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks were given to the United States and their families were not informed.
"Whoever captured my son is a terrorist," said Rana Ashraf Khan, whose son, Salman Ashraf, was detained while driving to work. "I am extremely worried about his safety."
The catering company Khan runs with with his son was accused of possible terrorist links by the U.S. Embassy when news of his detention broke.
U.S. officials have accused Shahzad of working with the Pakistani Taliban to organize the car bomb, a rudimentary device that failed to explode. Shahzad was arrested two days after the bombing attempt as he tried to fly out of the United States on a jetliner bound for the Middle East.
Seven people are known to have been detained in Islamabad and Rawalpindi. Officials have said four others were picked up in the southern city of Karachi, several of whom had links to a mosque there run by Jaish-e-Mohammad, a militant group with connections to al-Qaida. It is not clear whether any have since been released.
An intelligence official has identified one of those detained — Shoaib Mughal — as a go-between for Shahzad and the Pakistani Taliban in their hide-outs close the Afghan border. He was running a large computer dealership in Islamabad before his detention.
The other suspect alleged to have had some kind of involvement in the plot, identified only by his first name, Shahid, is alleged to have helped arrange money for Shahzad, but it is unclear what for.
Rahila Akhtar said around 20 intelligence agents and police officers came for her husband in the heat of mid-afternoon on May 17, jumping over the gate and banging on the door of their house. They asked for Humbal and started dragging him away.
"On seeing that, I was shocked and I started weeping, and I tightly held my husband's arm and said, 'I am not going to allow you to take him away,'" she said. She said officers told her not to make a scene.
They asked about her and Humbal, 35, and where his mobile phone was.
She went inside to get the phone, but when she returned Humbal was gone. She said hours later she received a telephone call from someone who did not give his name, assuring her that her husband would be safe.
Rahila Akhtar said her husband graduated from a private university in Islamabad and worked briefly for the government before starting a graphic design business. She said he worked from home to help her raise their three children, all under 5.
Pakistan's Human Rights Commission said it was investigating the detentions.
"No one should be arrested without prima facie evidence. They should be produced in court and their family should be informed," said I.A. Rehman, a leader of the commission. "Whatever agencies may be involved, the law must be followed."
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
TIME SQUARE BOMB - MUSLIM ALERTS POLICE
*** That's right folks. Of the 3 vendors directly responsible for seeing the suspicious vehicle, is a MUSLIM. MS ***
FROM: http://www.loonwatch.com/2010/05/man-who-alerted-police-to-times-square-bombing-is-muslim/
Aliou Niasse, a street vendor selling framed photographs of New York, said that he was the first to spot the car containing the bomb, which pulled up right in front of his cart on the corner of 45th street and Broadway next to the Marriott hotel.
“I didn’t see the car pull up or notice the driver because I was busy with customers. But when I looked up I saw that smoke appeared to be coming from the car. This would have been around 6.30pm.”
“I thought I should call 911, but my English is not very good and I had no credit left on my phone, so I walked over to Lance, who has the T-shirt stall next to mine, and told him. He said we shouldn’t call 911. Immediately he alerted a police officer near by,” said Mr Niasse, who is originally from Senegal and who has been a vendor in Times Square for about eight years.
FROM: http://www.loonwatch.com/2010/05/man-who-alerted-police-to-times-square-bombing-is-muslim/
Aliou Niasse, a street vendor selling framed photographs of New York, said that he was the first to spot the car containing the bomb, which pulled up right in front of his cart on the corner of 45th street and Broadway next to the Marriott hotel.
“I didn’t see the car pull up or notice the driver because I was busy with customers. But when I looked up I saw that smoke appeared to be coming from the car. This would have been around 6.30pm.”
“I thought I should call 911, but my English is not very good and I had no credit left on my phone, so I walked over to Lance, who has the T-shirt stall next to mine, and told him. He said we shouldn’t call 911. Immediately he alerted a police officer near by,” said Mr Niasse, who is originally from Senegal and who has been a vendor in Times Square for about eight years.
Friday, May 14, 2010
TIMES SQUARE BOMBER FAMILY IN SHOCK
*** Wannabe Jihadi's should ask themselves how they will answer Allah when He asks why you put your family through this - your mother, under whose feet heaven lies - your father, your siblings, the greater community. This is a shameful way that brings no honour, only heartache. MS ***
FROM: http://www.thestar.com/news/world/article/809182--times-square-bomb-suspect-s-family-in-shock-disbelief
On a bright spring day in 1976, a Pakistani flight instructor watched approvingly as his Royal Air Force trainees, flying in formation over the English countryside, wrote out “Five-O” in perfect trailer smoke. It was Queen Elizabeth II’s 50th birthday, and one of the proudest moments of Bahar ul-Haq’s life.
Today Haq, 70, a retired vice air marshal in Pakistan’s air force, is hiding in humiliation and shock, secluded somewhere in the northwestern city of Peshawar. His younger son, Faisal Shahzad, whom friends say he sent to the United States to study and to escape Pakistan’s problems, stands accused of attempting to explode a bomb in New York’s Times Square with help from Islamist militants.
Pakistani investigators are poring through family files and quizzing neighbours. Television crews have mobbed the lanes of this northwestern village where Haq grew up and have camped outside his home in Peshawar. International news programs have shown his son’s bearded face over and over, next to shots of the sport-utility vehicle in Manhattan that held the homemade bomb.
Haq “is very, very depressed. He is an honourable, patriotic man who worked hard to rise in the air force and raise his children cleanly. Now his family’s reputation has been destroyed,” said Hajji Sherzada, a retired importer who is a lifelong friend of Haq and said he has spoken to him by phone several times since the son’s arrest last week. “Every time his wife gets on the phone, she just cries.”
Haq has not made any statements and has not been seen in the past week. Provincial authorities said Sunday he was in “protective custody,” but relatives said he and his wife are in seclusion to avoid publicity.
Friends, relations and air force colleagues of Haq, interviewed in several northwestern communities and Islamabad this week, said they could make no sense of his son’s alleged actions or possible conversion to radical Islam.
Shahzad, 30, grew up in a stable community where most people were educated and many were part of Pakistan’s close-knit military world. His father, an accomplished pilot, rose from humble village roots to the top ranks of the air force, serving stints in Britain and Saudi Arabia. Several other family members were air force officers, including Shahzad’s maternal grandfather.
Over the years, Haq gained a reputation as an exceptional flight instructor and enjoyed training young pilots, especially in loops and other aerobatic stunts. He was invited to teach at an air academy in England for several years. Described by friends as a strict and protective father, he raised his children to become civilian professionals: Faisal’s older brother is an engineer in Canada, and one sister is a physician.
“Faisal’s father was liberal, not religious. We are all Muslims here, but there are no extremists in our community,” said Badal Khan, a cousin and finance officer for a telephone company, who spent Tuesday showing a team of federal police investigators around Mohib Banda.
Khan said Haq had “land and military connections, and he could have gotten his sons good jobs here, but he was worried about the environment in Pakistan and sent them both abroad to keep them away from trouble. We can’t understand what happened to Faisal over there.”
Shirzada Bacha, a maternal uncle of Shahzad, said that if Haq had suspected his son was involved in extremist activities, he would have “killed him in the house.”
Other family friends said they had seen little of Shahzad since he moved to the United States at age 18. Over the next decade, he earned a degree in business administration, married, got a job as a financial analyst, bought a house in Connecticut and became a U.S. citizen. About a year ago, when he returned home for a visit, friends and relatives noticed he was wearing a beard for the first time. But it occurred to no one that this might signify anything sinister.
“When I saw him with the beard, I saw nothing wrong with it. I was happy that even though he was living in America, he was staying close to Almighty God and to our traditions,” said Iftikhar Ahmed, a retired air force officer and nephew of Haq who lives in Islamabad.
Ahmed, 54, said he followed Shahzad’s upbringing closely, and he described the father as an “enlightened, upright” man who raised his son to be “balanced” in his views. “We sent a clean and innocent boy to America,” Ahmed said with bitterness. “If he went bad in America, why don’t you blame America instead of his family and his country?”
Sherzada and others close to the family scoffed at allegations by U.S. prosecutors that Shahzad had developed ties with Pakistani Taliban militants and had found his way to the rugged tribal area of North Waziristan for terrorist training. One relative said the young man did not know his way around after so many years abroad and always travelled with his father to family weddings and funerals.
“If Faisal ever got to Waziristan, and they got to know he was the son of an air marshal, they would kidnap him and ask for millions in ransom for his release,” Sherzada said, half-joking.
Ahmed and others from the military who know Haq took pains to point out that the Pakistani armed forces — and the small air force in particular — are a close-knit and highly professional meritocracy. They expressed solidarity with Haq and described his son’s arrest as a personal tragedy rather than as an incident that would damage the country’s military institutions as a whole.
In Utmanzai, the home of Shahzad’s mother, relatives recited prayers this week for his safe release. The village is known as a centre of Sufi mysticism, a moderate and freewheeling form of Islam that is ideologically poles apart from the severe, Saudi-inspired Wahhabi school of Islam that produced the Taliban and other extremist groups.
Bacha, the maternal uncle, said Shahzad was “never inclined to any fanaticism. I remember him dancing with his cousins, both girls and boys, at his own wedding” five years ago. At various wedding parties, the uncle said, “he danced to not only traditional Pashto music but fast music, and he wasn’t shy. Now when I think of him in custody for alleged radicalization, I am not ready to believe it.”
FROM: http://www.thestar.com/news/world/article/809182--times-square-bomb-suspect-s-family-in-shock-disbelief
On a bright spring day in 1976, a Pakistani flight instructor watched approvingly as his Royal Air Force trainees, flying in formation over the English countryside, wrote out “Five-O” in perfect trailer smoke. It was Queen Elizabeth II’s 50th birthday, and one of the proudest moments of Bahar ul-Haq’s life.
Today Haq, 70, a retired vice air marshal in Pakistan’s air force, is hiding in humiliation and shock, secluded somewhere in the northwestern city of Peshawar. His younger son, Faisal Shahzad, whom friends say he sent to the United States to study and to escape Pakistan’s problems, stands accused of attempting to explode a bomb in New York’s Times Square with help from Islamist militants.
Pakistani investigators are poring through family files and quizzing neighbours. Television crews have mobbed the lanes of this northwestern village where Haq grew up and have camped outside his home in Peshawar. International news programs have shown his son’s bearded face over and over, next to shots of the sport-utility vehicle in Manhattan that held the homemade bomb.
Haq “is very, very depressed. He is an honourable, patriotic man who worked hard to rise in the air force and raise his children cleanly. Now his family’s reputation has been destroyed,” said Hajji Sherzada, a retired importer who is a lifelong friend of Haq and said he has spoken to him by phone several times since the son’s arrest last week. “Every time his wife gets on the phone, she just cries.”
Haq has not made any statements and has not been seen in the past week. Provincial authorities said Sunday he was in “protective custody,” but relatives said he and his wife are in seclusion to avoid publicity.
Friends, relations and air force colleagues of Haq, interviewed in several northwestern communities and Islamabad this week, said they could make no sense of his son’s alleged actions or possible conversion to radical Islam.
Shahzad, 30, grew up in a stable community where most people were educated and many were part of Pakistan’s close-knit military world. His father, an accomplished pilot, rose from humble village roots to the top ranks of the air force, serving stints in Britain and Saudi Arabia. Several other family members were air force officers, including Shahzad’s maternal grandfather.
Over the years, Haq gained a reputation as an exceptional flight instructor and enjoyed training young pilots, especially in loops and other aerobatic stunts. He was invited to teach at an air academy in England for several years. Described by friends as a strict and protective father, he raised his children to become civilian professionals: Faisal’s older brother is an engineer in Canada, and one sister is a physician.
“Faisal’s father was liberal, not religious. We are all Muslims here, but there are no extremists in our community,” said Badal Khan, a cousin and finance officer for a telephone company, who spent Tuesday showing a team of federal police investigators around Mohib Banda.
Khan said Haq had “land and military connections, and he could have gotten his sons good jobs here, but he was worried about the environment in Pakistan and sent them both abroad to keep them away from trouble. We can’t understand what happened to Faisal over there.”
Shirzada Bacha, a maternal uncle of Shahzad, said that if Haq had suspected his son was involved in extremist activities, he would have “killed him in the house.”
Other family friends said they had seen little of Shahzad since he moved to the United States at age 18. Over the next decade, he earned a degree in business administration, married, got a job as a financial analyst, bought a house in Connecticut and became a U.S. citizen. About a year ago, when he returned home for a visit, friends and relatives noticed he was wearing a beard for the first time. But it occurred to no one that this might signify anything sinister.
“When I saw him with the beard, I saw nothing wrong with it. I was happy that even though he was living in America, he was staying close to Almighty God and to our traditions,” said Iftikhar Ahmed, a retired air force officer and nephew of Haq who lives in Islamabad.
Ahmed, 54, said he followed Shahzad’s upbringing closely, and he described the father as an “enlightened, upright” man who raised his son to be “balanced” in his views. “We sent a clean and innocent boy to America,” Ahmed said with bitterness. “If he went bad in America, why don’t you blame America instead of his family and his country?”
Sherzada and others close to the family scoffed at allegations by U.S. prosecutors that Shahzad had developed ties with Pakistani Taliban militants and had found his way to the rugged tribal area of North Waziristan for terrorist training. One relative said the young man did not know his way around after so many years abroad and always travelled with his father to family weddings and funerals.
“If Faisal ever got to Waziristan, and they got to know he was the son of an air marshal, they would kidnap him and ask for millions in ransom for his release,” Sherzada said, half-joking.
Ahmed and others from the military who know Haq took pains to point out that the Pakistani armed forces — and the small air force in particular — are a close-knit and highly professional meritocracy. They expressed solidarity with Haq and described his son’s arrest as a personal tragedy rather than as an incident that would damage the country’s military institutions as a whole.
In Utmanzai, the home of Shahzad’s mother, relatives recited prayers this week for his safe release. The village is known as a centre of Sufi mysticism, a moderate and freewheeling form of Islam that is ideologically poles apart from the severe, Saudi-inspired Wahhabi school of Islam that produced the Taliban and other extremist groups.
Bacha, the maternal uncle, said Shahzad was “never inclined to any fanaticism. I remember him dancing with his cousins, both girls and boys, at his own wedding” five years ago. At various wedding parties, the uncle said, “he danced to not only traditional Pashto music but fast music, and he wasn’t shy. Now when I think of him in custody for alleged radicalization, I am not ready to believe it.”
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