Iraqis Accused of Terror Plot Silent as Trial Begins in Germany

German federal prosecutors say the defendants are members of the Iraqi militant organization Ansar al Islam who conspired to assassinate Allawi in a plan hatched only days before his brief trip to Berlin in December 2004.

The accused -- Ata Abdoulaziz Rashid, Mazen Ali Hussein, and Rafik Mohamad Yousef -- refused to testify as the trial began on Tuesday amid tight security in the southwestern German city of Stuttgart.

They are the latest suspects being tried under a law adopted in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States that allows Germany to jail members of foreign terror groups for up to 10 years. The law had previously covered only domestic terror organizations.

However, the men have not actually been charged over the suspected plot to kill Allawi. Authorities insist they foiled an attack but concede that they know too little of the plan and are not sure it was far enough advanced to warrant prosecution under German law.

A terrorist web

Ansar al Islam, a predominantly Kurdish group, is believed to have links to the slain extremist Abu Musab al Zarqawi's al Qaeda organization in Iraq. Intelligence services estimate it has about 100 members in Germany connected to a wider network of supporters across western

Europe.

Prosecutor Silke Ritzert said Ansar al Islam aimed to establish a "radical Islamic theocracy based on the former Taliban regime in Afghanistan."

The defendants were netted in three different cities -- Augsburg, Berlin and Stuttgart -- when police swooped on Dec. 3, 2004 on the basis of information obtained from tapped phone calls

between the three.

Planning an assassination

Ata Abdoulaziz Rashid, who was arrested in Stuttgart, is believed to have been the ringleader and to have been informed of other attacks planned by Ansar al Islam. Rashid, 32, is suspected of having collected funds and recruited potential suicide bombers for the group, which has claimed responsibility for a series of bloody attacks on US troops and aid workers.

Authorities believe Mazen Ali Hussein, 26, was a close accomplice of Rashid's who also drummed up funding for Ansar al Islam in Germany. The prosecution said it believed they had raised some 75,000 euros ($94,000).

The third suspect in the dock, 31-year-old Rafik Mohamad Yousef, is believed to have approached Hussein just five days before Allawi's arrival in Germany seeking support for his idea to kill the prime minister.

"The further preparations and the execution of the planned attack were foiled due to the arrest of the three accused in the early morning hours of Dec. 3," Ritzert said.

With the help of informants

Germany's former federal prosecutor, Kay Nehm, said at the time that inside sources had tipped off the group about Allawi's movements.

At least two events on Allawi's schedule were called off for security reasons, including a meeting with Iraqi exiles in Berlin which police believe the alleged plotters had hoped to target.

In January, Iraqi Lokman Amin Mohammed became the first person convicted in Germany on the charge of membership in a foreign terror organization. He was sentenced to seven years in jail for belonging to Ansar al Islam and a splinter group, Jaish Ansar al Sunna.

Meanwhile Tuesday, another trial of two Iraqi men aged 34 and 40, accused of raising money for Ansar al Islam to mount attacks in Iraq, opened in the southern city of Munich.