Norway terror suspect held in Germany due in Oslo
The third man arrested last week on suspicions of having links to Al-Qaeda and planning a terror attack on Norway will arrive in Oslo Wednesday after being extradited from Germany, Norway’s security police (PST) said.
“He will come to Oslo today (Wednesday). As soon as he is on Norwegian soil it will be decided when the court hearing will be to decide if he will be put in custody or not,” PST’s spokesperson Martin Bernsen told AFP.
The man, identified by Norwegian police as a 37-year-old Iraqi Kurd who also holds a Norwegian residence permit, was arrested in Germany where he had spent several days as a tourist.
The detention period is to give prosecutors time to prepare the official charges.
The court meeting to determine if the suspect would be detained will most likely be held on Friday, Bernsen said.
The Oslo district court decided Monday that the two other suspects, who had been arrested near Oslo, would be held for four weeks, with two weeks in complete isolation.
The suspects are Mikael Davud, a 39-year-old ethnic Uighur from China who is a Norwegian citizen, and David Jakobsen, a 31-year-old Uzbek with a legal residence permit in Norway.
Jakobsen has appealed the verdict, his lawyer Kjell T Dahl saying he had been a PST informant since November 2009.
Bernsen acknowledged Jakobsen was a PST informant but said he was already a suspect in the case when he came forward with information.
“He was not an informant in the usual sense of the word. He was already a suspect when he contacted us,” Bernsen said.
The three men were arrested on July 8 as part of a PST investigation. Police say they have links to Al-Qaeda and were planning one or more attacks on Norwegian soil.
National prosecutor Jan Glent told reporters last week the three suspects were believed to have links to Al-Qaeda and to attempted attacks in New York and Manchester, England.
Norwegian tabloid VG said Friday the explosives the suspects had prepared had been rendered harmless by the PST, who swapped the bomb-making chemicals they had ordered at pharmacies with a harmless liquid.
Source: Expatica.com
