This article has been posted to DoctorZin’s New News Blog!
Posted on 08/04/2004 11:16:34 AM PDT by knighthawk
The QE2 liner was among the targets selected by two South Africans -- captured in Pakistan along with a senior al-Qaida terrorist -- who were plotting attacks on tourist sites in their home country.
Raja Munawar Hussain, the chief of police in Gujrat, the eastern Pakistani city where they were arrested, said several maps of South African cities among the items seized after the raid, which also netted Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani, a Tanzanian with a A£13.7 million bounty on his head for the 1998 twin East Africa embassy bombings.
"They were all very well trained terrorists because of the way they fought the gun battle and the way they engaged us for 12 hours. This is something no common man could have done," said Hussain.
A Lahore-based intelligence official said the men wanted to target tourist sites in Johannesburg, South Africa's commercial centre. The men are believed to have arrived in Pakistan on a flight from the United Arab Emirates just days before their arrest.
Johannesburg newspaper, ThisDay, said the Queen Elizabeth 2 was a target that was supposed to be attacked when it arrived in Durban or Cape Town from Mauritius.
Anothere newspaper, The Star quoted police sources as saying that key landmarks among the targets included the Carlton Centre shopping mall, the Johannesburg Stock Exchange and the Ellis Park Stadium in Johannesburg parliament and the V&A Waterfront mall in Cape Town and the US Embassy, government buildings and the Sheraton Hotel in Pretoria.
Ronnie Mamoepa, a spokesman for South Africa's Department of Foreign Affairs refused to confirm the reports.
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http://archive.thisishampshire.net/2004/8/14/24062.html
"Floating target"
From the archive, first published Saturday 14th Aug 2004.
ARTICLE SNIPPET: "In New York, FBI agents relentlessly continued the hunt for the perpetrator of the threat against QE2 until finally a New York shoe repairer was charged with attempted extortion.
He was eventually found guilty and given a maximum 20-year jail sentence by a Manhattan court."
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