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Al-Ahram Weekly 2 - 8 March 2000 Issue No. 471 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 2 - 8 March 2000 Issue No. 471
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Interview Features Focus Heritage Travel Living Sports Profile People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters
'Albanian returnees' executed
By Jailan HalawiTwo leading figures in the militant organisation Jihad, Ahmed Ibrahim El-Naggar and Ahmed Ismail Osman, were hanged last Thursday at a Cairo prison. Both, along with 10 others, had been extradited to Egypt by Albania in 1998. The 12 were put on trial, along with 97 other Jihad members, before a military tribunal last year in a case dubbed by the local press as "the returnees from Albania".
El-Naggar, a key defendant in the case, was sentenced to life with hard labour, but had been sentenced to death in absentia in October 1997 for his role in a 1995 conspiracy to blow up Cairo's historic Khan El-Khalili bazaar.
Osman was sentenced to 15 years hard labour in the "returnees from Albania" case, but had been sentenced to death in absentia in 1994 for ordering a failed assassination attempt on then Prime Minister Atef Sidki.
A number of Jihad members are known to be close associates of Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden, accused by the United States of masterminding the August 1998 twin bombings of its embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. Jihad, led by Ayman El-Zawahri, joined the Front for the Liberation of Islamic Holy Sites set up in February 1998 in Peshawar, Pakistan, under the leadership of bin Laden.
The confessions of the two prominent Jihad members helped authorities get a better understanding of how the group is organised overseas, dismantle Jihad cells in Egypt and arrest members infiltrating from abroad, security sources said.
Although none of the defendants who faced the death penalty was accused of having carried out attacks themselves, they were charged with having "headed an organisation whose aim was to thwart the working of state institutions and using terrorism to achieve its aims".
They were also accused of having set up paramilitary training camps and ordering "insurgency against the government, the tracking and assassination of public figures and security officials and attacks on public and economic institutions".
Jihad and Al-Gama'a Al-Islamiya have been fighting since 1992 to topple the government and establish an Islamist state. More than 1,200 people have died in the insurgency, mostly militants and policemen.
The number of clashes between security forces and militants has fallen steeply since the November 1997 Luxor massacre which claimed the lives of 58 foreigners and four Egyptians. The Ministry of Interior has stepped up security measures in line with the preemptive strategy adopted by Interior Minister Habib El-Adli. This strategy focuses on reining in terrorism while reintegrating militants into society once they "repent" and are released.
During the past two years, thousands of detained militants have been released, prison conditions have been improved and detainees allowed more visits.
The Luxor carnage was followed by a cease-fire declaration from what could be described as the "moderate" wing of Al-Gama'a's incarcerated leaders. This campaign was spearheaded by lawyer Montasser El-Zayat who was detained for seven months in 1995 for acting as Al-Gama'a's de facto spokesman. He and others inside this wing maintain that violence has harmed the group and denied it the benefits of public activities. The government had tolerated the group before it took up arms in mid-1992.
Tough state security tactics appear to have broken the power of the militant groups, whose leaders are mostly dead, in prison or on the run. Many of the networks they once used to coordinate the flow of orders, guns and money have folded.
"We are now in a much better situation," a security source, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Al-Ahram Weekly.
"Contacts between the terrorists abroad and their followers at home have been cut off almost completely and those hiding in Egypt have been deprived of their sources of finance and arms. The expatriates are constantly on the run and do not have the opportunity to mastermind fresh attacks. However, we will remain alert because we cannot trust terrorists or their declarations," the source said.
