US offers $5 million reward to nab 'sleeper' terrorist

The United States authorities are offering a reward of $5 million to catch a New York man, Jaber Elbaneh, who is accused of conspiring with a 'sleeper cell' of six suspected al Qaeda members trained in Pakistan and Afghanistan, who operated from the city.

The charge is based on the group's suspected attendance at an Al Qaeda-affiliated terrorist training camp.

A member of a 'sleeper cell' lives like any ordinary citizen until his or her terrorist superiors activate a conspiracy.

Elbaneh, 37, who had lived in Lackawanna, New York, is now believed to be in Yemen and is the last to be charged. Six others were indicted on October 21, 2002 by a Federal Grand Jury in Buffalo, New York on charges of conspiring to provide material support to terrorists from the spring of 2001 through September 13, 2002.

They were also accused of receiving military training at the Al Farooq camp affiliated with Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda near Kandahar, Afghanistan, as also in Pakistan.

The material-support statute prohibits anyone from knowingly providing or conspiring to provide support to a foreign terrorist organisation, as designated by the state department. Al Qaeda was so designated in October 1999.

The six -- all Yemeni Americans ranging in age from 23 to 30 -- admitted in court that they received training at Al Farooq in the use of a number of weapons, including assault rifles, rocket-propelled grenades, plastic explosives, Molotov cocktails and landmines.

Mukhtar al-Bakri, Yahya Goba, Yasein Taher, Shafal Mosed, Faysal Galab, and Sahim Alwan have pleaded guilty and agreed to cooperate with the government in its ongoing investigation.

All seven grew up or lived in Lackwanna, about 5 miles south of Buffalo. All are married and five have children.

An FBI affidavit in the case said that al-Bakri admitted that he and others, including Elbaneh, travelled to Pakistan in the summer of 2001 to attend religious training and spent a week in Karachi before moving on to Kandahar, Afghanistan.

The affidavit said the men then went to the Al Farooq training camp, where they received weapons training.

The affidavit, by FBI Agent Edward J Needham, said 200 persons were being trained at the camp at the time and they were divided into smaller groups of 20. Each member was given a code name. While his group was at the camp, al-Bakri told the FBI, bin Laden visited and gave a speech to all the trainees.

According to the affidavit, bin Laden talked about 'the alliance of the Islamic Jihad and al Qaeda' and espoused anti-US and anti-Israeli sentiments.