U.S. Charges 3 in Drug Case With Helping Al Qaeda
Federal prosecutors in Manhattan unsealed narcotics and terrorism charges on Friday against three West Africans (Mali natives) they identified as associates of Al Qaeda and a related terrorist group.
While the United States Drug Enforcement Administration has long maintained that Al Qaeda has been involved in drug trafficking, officials at the agency said the case represented the first time such charges had been brought against people linked with the group.
The three men — identified as Oumar Issa, Harouna Touré and Idriss Abelrahman — were arrested on Wednesday in Ghana and flown to the United States on Thursday night, law enforcement officials said.
They were charged with narcotics terrorism conspiracy, the officials said, as well as conspiracy to provide material support to terrorist groups — Al Qaeda and Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.
The case grew out of sting operation, officials said. Two Drug Enforcement Administration informants posing as members of FARC, the Colombian terrorist group, approached the men, seeking their help to move large quantities of cocaine from West Africa, through North Africa and the desert and into Spain, the officials said.
The three men, who identified themselves to the informants as either associates of Al Qaeda, or of a related group, Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, told the informants that they had provided similar transportation and security services to members of Al Qaeda, the officials said.
The three men were charged under statutes passed in 2006 that give federal drug agents the authority to prosecute narcotics and terrorism crimes committed anywhere in the world if a link between a drug offense and a specified act of terrorism or a terrorist organization can be established.
