GERMANY: The retrial of a suspected al-Qaeda terrorist who was friends with the September 11th pilots opened in Hamburg yesterday amid tight security and renewed accusations of obstruction and torture of prisoners by US authorities.
Moroccan-born Mr Mounir El Motassadeq (30) was sentenced to 15 years in prison last year for aiding the attacks on New York and Washington but was released in April after Germany's highest court ruled that German and American authorities had withheld vital evidence.
The US Justice Department said in a letter to the court yesterday that it would provide declassified al-Qaeda information to German authorities, but would continue to refuse requests for access to key al-Qaeda figures in its custody.
"It is the duty of the Justice Ministry to protect its sources and methods," said a letter sent to the German embassy in Washington shortly before the trial began. It added that "interactive access" to al-Qaeda figures could hamper its own investigations and pose a security threat.
German prosecutors had requested access to six al-Qaeda witnesses, including Mr Ramzi Binalshibh who, before his arrest in Pakistan two years ago, claimed to have masterminded the September 11th attacks.
The letter declined to confirm or deny whether the leading al-Qaeda figures mentioned by the Germans were in US custody or not, throwing doubt on whether a conviction will be possible.
As a bearded Mr El Motassadeq listened, his lawyer moved to have the trial dismissed yesterday, saying it was "highly likely" that information obtained from al-Qaeda figures during interrogation in US custody was gleaned using torture and therefore inadmissible in law in German courts.
"In this swamp of torture and prison camps, no court can ascertain the truth any more," said Mr Josef Graessle-Münscher, citing prisoner abuses in Iraq and at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.
His remarks prompted a Bostonian, Mr Dominic Puopolo (38), whose mother died in the attacks and who was in the courtroom yesterday, to shout across the courtroom: "You're desecrating the memories of 3,000 people who died, including my mother."
Mr El Motassadeq is accused of being a key member of the Hamburg terrorist cell behind the September 11th attacks and of acting as an accessory in the murder of the 3,066 people who died.
He admitted during his first trial that he had trained at an al-Qaeda camp in Afghanistan and that he was a close friend of Mohamed Atta, who US authorities believe crashed the first aircraft into the World Trade Centre in New York.
He signed the will of Atta and arranged money to pay for flying lessons by having access to the bank account of Marwan Al Shehi, the man believed to have piloted the second aircraft.
But Mr El Motassadeq, who has lived with his wife and two children in Germany for more than a decade, denies knowing anything of the September 11th plans and told the court that "violence is never the answer".
German authorities were shocked to discover after September 11th, 2001, that the attacks had been planned under the noses of police in Hamburg.
The government promised a full investigation and prosecutions, making the collapse of two separate September 11th trials in Germany a source of acute embarrassment.
Yesterday's letter from the Justice Ministry appears to suggest that a visit to the US last April by Mr Kay Nehm, Germany's chief federal prosecutor, to seek interrogation records of al-Qaeda suspects has been unsuccessful.