Abdel Qadir Mamour

Nov. 30 - There's some background on a Senegalese cleric, Abdel Qadir Mamour, who was deported from Itay in mid-November Deported cleric 'met bin Laden' including his relationship with Osama bin Laden:

A SEBEGALESE (sic) Muslim cleric deported from Italy as a danger to state security was quoted today as telling a pan-Arab newspaper that he had met three times with Osama bin Laden, leader of the al-Qaeda terrorist network.

The cleric, Abdel Qadir Mamour, told the London-based Asharq Al-Awsat in an interview by telephone from Dakar, Senegal, that he had the meetings with bin Laden in Sudan from 1993 to 1996.

Mamour said bin Laden had provided money to finance his trading in diamonds between Africa and Belgium, but did not say how much money was involved or if bin Laden was involved in the business. (Emphasis added)

[...]

Mamour angered Italian authorities by saying in an earlier interview that Italian soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq would be attacked, as well as Italian diplomats, because Italy was aiding the US-led military presence. His statement followed the November 12 car bomb at the Italian barracks in Nasiriyah, Iraq, that killed 19 Italians.

In his interview with Asharq Al-Awsat, Mamour said Italian authorities deported him because they found at his home some CD-ROMs contained the wills of four suicide attackers in a bombing in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, in May.

Mamour was quoted as saying he got the tapes from a fundamentalist Muslim in London so they could be distributed in Europe, but did not name the man who sent the tapes.

Mamour claims his Italian wife and five children saved him from being sent to Guantanamo, and he was interrogated for four days by Senegalese authorities.

There has been speculation about a bin Laden connection with the diamond trade, and Belguim is right at the center of it.

No blood for diamonds will undoubtably be the next slogan pushed by the anti-war groups.

Posted by: Debbye at 09:43 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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