11/29/2001

Associated Press

CAIRO, Egypt – The son of Omar Abdel-Rahman, an Egyptian cleric linked to the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center, has been captured by anti-Taliban forces in Afghanistan, a brother and U.S. officials said Wednesday.

Cairo lawyer Montasser el-Zayat, who defends Islamic militant suspects, said the captured son, Ahmed Abdel-Rahman was being held in the northern Afghan city of Mazar-e-Sharif and his interrogators included Americans. El-Zayat said forces in Afghanistan were looking for Ahmed's brother, Mohammed, who was also in the country.

A U.S. official in Washington said the northern alliance had captured Ahmed Abdel-Rahman, but that there was no indication he was in U.S. hands. The official said the younger Abdel-Rahman was a top al-Qaida operative.

A third brother, Abdullah, who lives in Cairo, told The Associated Press that Mohammed had called from Afghanistan last month to give him the news that the northern alliance caught Ahmed Abdel-Rahman. He said he hadn't heard from either brother since then.

"There is no news now ... it's very difficult to get information there. There are no means of communications," Abdullah said.

There were unconfirmed reports of Ahmed Abdel-Rahman's capture in October.

The lawyer, el-Zayat, who once belonged to the Egyptian militant group that looked to Omar Abdel-Rahman as a spiritual leader, said Thursday that his information on the younger Abdel-Rahman's capture and interrogation came from an Islamic activist in London. He said he had been told that Ahmed Abdel-Rahman had been tortured by his interrogators in Afghanistan.

Ahmed, 28, Mohammed, 29 and Abdullah are all sons of Omar Abdel-Rahman, a 63-year-old blind cleric considered the leader of Egyptian Islamic militants. He was sentenced to life in prison for conspiring to assassinate Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and blow up five New York City landmarks, including the United Nations. The 1993 World Trade Center conspirators were known to have attended his lectures.

El-Zayat said the younger Abdel-Rahmans were not members of Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network, but the brothers' family name gives them a degree of prominence. Earlier this year, Mohammed Abdel-Rahman attended a gathering of al-Qaida leaders organized to call for their father's release, el-Zayat said. He was heard calling for Muslims to retrieve their pride in a video of the event, but he was not shown.

Abdullah Abdel-Rahman also said his brothers were ordinary fighters.

Ahmed and Mohammed Abdel-Rahman left for Afghanistan in the late 1980s to take part in the war against the Soviet occupiers and stayed on after the Soviets retreated in 1989. The anti-Soviet war drew thousands of Arabs eager to help the Muslims of Afghanistan; many stayed and are now allied with the Taliban.

Ahmed Abdel-Rahman uses the nom de guerre Seif Allah, which means God's sword; Mohammed Abdel-Rahman uses the nom de guerre Asad Allah, which means Lion of God.