Most wanted Al-Qaida suspect jailed

A Yemeni court has sent back to jail an al-Qaida suspect on the US list of most wanted militants after his release earlier this year prompted US complaints.

Jaber Elbaneh, a Yemeni-American thought to be a major figure in the fatal bombing of the US warship Cole in 2000, was among 23 prisoners, including convicted al-Qaida militants, who tunnelled their way out of a jail in Sanaa in February 2006.

He turned himself into Yemeni authorities in May 2007 but was allowed to walk free after agreeing to attend his trial.

Elbaneh had been sentenced in absentia to more than a decade in jail but Yemeni law demands a retrial if someone sentenced in absentia surrenders.

His new trial began on March 9 and he had been in court for the hearings. The magistrate ruled at a hearing on May 18 that Elbaneh should be jailed once more.

His release had irked the United States, which had complained to Yemen.

Yemen joined the US "war on terrorism" after the Sept 11, 2001 attacks, but the ancestral home of Osama bin Laden is still viewed in the West as a haven for Islamist militants.

Dozens of militants are jailed in Yemen for involvement in bombings of Western targets and clashes with authorities.

Elbaneh is on the list of "Most Wanted Terrorists" in the US, where he is charged with providing material support to al-Qaida, US diplomatic sources say.

Yemen says Elbaneh also helped to plan the 2002 attack on the French oil supertanker Limburg off Yemen's coast.

He is linked to the "Lackawanna Six" and wanted by the FBI.

The Lackawanna Six refers to a group of Yemeni-Americans who attended an al-Qaida training camp in Afghanistan in 2001.

The cell was named after the men's home town in New York state.

The 2006 jailbreak embarrassed the government and raised questions among Western allies about Yemen's security measures.

Al-Qaida in Yemen vowed in January to release its prisoners from the country's jails to retaliate for the killing of militants by the government of the Arabian Peninsula country.

Washington offered a reward of up to $5 million for information leading to Jaber Elbaneh's arrest, but Yemeni law forbisd his extradition even after police arrested him in 2004 for membership in al-Qaida.

The US asked Yemen to hand over Elbaneh when he was in Yemeni custody in January 2004. He was never extradited.

Agencies

(China Daily 05/20/2008 page23)