Man held in Madrid thought to be militant group's leader in Europe
MADRID -- A Moroccan held in the March 11 train attacks in Madrid may be the leader in Europe of a militant Islamist group accused of carrying out the Casablanca bombings in 2003, a source close to the investigation said yesterday.
The shadowy Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group, or MICG, is suspected of playing a role in the Madrid attacks, which killed 191 people, as well as the May 2003 bombings in Casablanca, in which 12 suicide bombers and 33 others were killed.
Spanish police arrested four Moroccans, all suspected MICG members, on Lanzarote, one of Spain's Canary Islands, on Friday. Their leader was named as 41-year-old Hassan el Haski, the focus of two investigations by Spain's High Court.
Judge Juan del Olmo had issued a warrant for Haski's arrest in connection with the March attacks, and Judge Baltasar Garzon is probing his links to the MICG.
Spanish police think Haski could be the MICG leader in Europe, the source close to the probe said. "It's a theory that has quite a lot of strength," the source said.
But both the source and Robert Meulenbroek, a spokesman for Amsterdam's public prosecutor, denied a report in the Spanish newspaper ABC yesterday that Dutch police had told Spain that Haski might be linked to the killing of Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh in November.
Spanish police think that Haski fled a crackdown on suspected MICG members earlier this year in France and Belgium, and that he and the other Moroccans detained Friday were building a base for the group in the Canary Islands.
France detained several people last month in a probe into the financing of the group.
Former interior minister Angel Acebes said three weeks after the March 11 bombings that the probe was focusing on the MICG.
The Interior Ministry said the MICG is part of Salafist Jihad, an ultraconservative Islamist movement, and is closely linked to Osama bin Laden's Al Qaeda network.
MICG goals include "establishing an Islamic state in Morocco and supporting Al Qaeda [holy war] against the West," according to the State Department.
The Madrid bombings are widely seen as retaliation for the former government's decision to send troops to Iraq.
Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, elected three days after the bombings, quickly implemented an election pledge to bring home Spain's 1,300 troops.
