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How a Town Became a Terror Hub
Spanish and European intelligence officials acknowledged they had underestimated the presence of the Moroccan radicals. "We didn't see what was going on in the shadows with the Moroccans," said Claude Moniquet, director of the European Strategic Intelligence and Security Center, a Brussels research organization. "In Europe, agencies were not paying them that much attention. The idea was that they were just logistical cells."
In the past two years, police have broken up GICM cells in Italy, Belgium, Spain, France and the Netherlands. Moniquet estimated that the GICM has a few hundred committed followers in Europe and North Africa, as well as 1,000 to 2,000 sympathizers.
  The town of Maaseik is home to about 800 people of Moroccan origin. There is a new mosque in the town, but little overt history of Islamic radicalism. (By Roger Ulburghs For The Washington Post) |
Some intelligence officials characterize the GICM as a loose alliance of cells that operate independently. Others say there is evidence that the network is more structured and that the sleeper cells bide their time until they receive orders from the central leadership.
In April 2004, French police arrested six alleged GICM members in Paris and charged them with supporting a "terrorist enterprise." As in Maaseik, however, investigators did not find evidence that a specific plot was in the works.
Moustapha Baouchi, the alleged leader, told French interrogators that the cell raised some money and sporadically kept in touch with counterparts in Italy, Spain, Belgium and Britain. But otherwise it was content to wait, knowing that an assignment would eventually come.
"In effect, we were a group united in jihad," Baouchi said, according to a transcript of his interrogation. "This jihad could well have taken place in Morocco, or in any other country that we chose to destabilize. Our group was ready because we possessed the military training."
Locals' Disbelief
The Maaseik cell began to unravel in January 2004. Khalid Bouloudo, a pastry chef who was born in the town, was stopped by police across the border in the Netherlands for driving with a broken taillight. After a routine records check, officers discovered he was wanted on a terrorism warrant in Morocco and took him into custody.
The arrest jeopardized the surveillance operation being conducted by Belgian state security officials, who had not notified Maaseik's leaders of their investigation. After dodging questions from angry residents who wondered how a suspected terrorist could have been in their midst, Belgian federal police rounded up four other GICM suspects in mid-March. But investigators had only a partial grasp of the network's reach.
In early June 2004, they were tipped off by Italian anti-terrorism police about a Moroccan suspect in Brussels. In wiretapped conversations recorded by the Italians, the man was overheard telling another radical in Milan that he and three friends were ready to carry out suicide attacks in Belgium.
Belgian police responded with several raids and made 15 arrests in what they called Operation Asparagus 2. "We don't know yet if they are active members of the GICM, of al Qaeda or of another terrorist group," Glen Audenaert, head of the federal police, said at a news conference at the time. "But that they were preparing an attack is beyond dispute."
All but one of those suspects was later released, however, and it is unclear what, if anything, they were planning.
More arrests followed. In July 2004, Belgian police nabbed Lahoussine Haski, the most-wanted suspect in Saudi Arabia, in Maaseik after he returned from a trip to Syria and Turkey. Two months later, they arrested another Maaseik man and charged him with membership in the GICM.
In December, Spanish police arrested Haski's brother, Hassan Haski, in the Canary Islands and charged him with trying to set up yet another GICM cell to launch attacks on the Spanish mainland. Investigators later concluded that Hassan Haski had visited Maaseik on six or seven occasions. Spanish court documents describe him as "one of the most important current leaders" of the network.
Christophe Marchand, an attorney for Lahoussine Haski, said his client was innocent. He said the evidence against Haski was based largely on coerced interrogations of GICM suspects in Morocco and France. "There was a lot of pressure put on these people," he said. "It's hard to know where all this information is coming from."
In Maaseik, residents still find it hard to believe that their town served as a hub for an international terrorist network. In an attempt to contain extremism, the town passed a law last year that bans anyone from wearing a burqa. The fine: 125 euros, or about $150.
Five of the six Maaseik women who kicked off the burqa controversy have agreed to obey the ordinance. The only holdout: Samira Haski, wife of one of the GICM defendants and sister of another. She is challenging the measure in court, according to Mayor Creemers.
"Sometimes, I see her on the street, still wearing it," he said. "She sees me, and she runs away."
