In Morocco's 'Chemist,' A Glimpse of Al-Qaeda

At first, Moroccan authorities described the perpetrators as amateurs who lacked any international connections. But since then, investigators have concluded that the bombers intended to strike hotels, cruise ships and other tourist targets. Houssaini's arrest disrupted the plans and exposed the network, they say.

Police have arrested two other key figures in the network who had trained in al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan. Abdelaziz Benzine, who police believe served as the brains of the network alongside Houssaini, was arrested March 11, hours before the first suicide bombing this spring.

Another collaborator, Abdelaziz Habbouch, was arrested May 28; police suspect him of playing a lead role in the May 2003 Casablanca bombings and helping to recruit fighters for al-Qaeda forces in Iraq.

"It's obvious that many of these people are linked directly to al-Qaeda," said Mohamed Darif, a Moroccan terrorism analyst and political science professor at Hassan II University in Mohammedia. "The police are discovering that these cells were much more advanced than they had thought. This is scary for them, and it should be."

Police said they seized more than 450 pounds of explosives, concocted primarily from ammonium nitrate and aluminum powder, a common al-Qaeda bombmaking recipe.

According to Moroccan police documents, Houssaini began teaching other members of the network, including Benzine and Habbouch, how to manufacture explosives and detonators using techniques he had learned in Afghanistan. He also recorded bombmaking instructions on a computer disk and tested the cells' makeshift explosives, records show.

Houssaini has been charged in Morocco with organizing a criminal enterprise and other terrorism-related activities. But he has not been formally accused of involvement in attacks that took place after his arrest, said his attorney, Tawfiq Mousaif. "The state so far hasn't presented any evidence at all pertaining to the charges," said Mousaif, who otherwise declined to comment on the allegations.

Years in Spain

Houssaini was born in Meknes, a north-central Moroccan city with about 500,000 residents. A professor's son, he studied chemistry in college and won a Moroccan government scholarship to attend graduate school at the University of Valencia in Spain.

The scholarship, however, paid only a few dollars a month in living expenses. Houssaini was forced to take frequent breaks from his studies and lab work to take odd jobs, said his academic adviser, Francisco F. Perez, a chemistry professor at the university.

"He was a hardworking individual," Perez said in a phone interview. "He would come for a month, then not show up for 10 days because he was selling carpets and junk at street markets, and when he got enough money to get by, he would come back."

When Houssaini arrived in Valencia in December 1992, he was not visibly religious and would occasionally join students or faculty for drinks, Perez recalled. The professor said he noticed a few changes toward the end of Houssaini's time in Spain, however: The student grew a beard and printed out so many religious poems and Koranic verses from a lab computer that he drew a reprimand.

"He was very interested in social justice," Perez said. "He said his country was governed by tyrants. . . . He never said anything bad about Western countries. Quite the opposite -- he envied our political regime here and said he wanted our political regime and democracy to be installed in Morocco."