Woolwich murder suspect tried to enter Somalia twice

Irish Independent
Tuesday, May 28, 2013

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The suspected Woolwich murderer Michael Adebolajo made a second bid to travel to Somalia to join extremists there just last year. The alleged Islamist wanted to try again to head for the Jihadist hotbed after his first attempt failed in 2010.

However, he was stopped from going by MI5 who warned he would be caught again by the Kenyans if he did, sources suggested last night.

It raises the prospect of whether Adebolajo did manage to travel out again after Abu Nusaybah claimed last week that his friend had been caught and tortured in Kenya last year.

The latest development came as news reports in Kenya claimed authorities there were told by British officials in 2010 that Adebolajo was not on any "criminal watch lists" at the time.

Friends of the suspect have also claimed British intelligence officers first approached him as a possible recruit when he was in detention there more than two years ago.

Mr Nusaybah, whose real name is Ibrahim Hassan, was arrested shortly after his interview with BBC's 'Newsnight' on Friday.

He is being questioned on suspicion of terror charges.

MISTREATED

His lawyer repeated his client's claims that Aderbolajo had been mistreated in Kenya and claimed that the British embassy was aware.

He said: "Michael had told Abu Nusaybah that when he was being tortured he asked for the British embassy to be contacted and the torturers said 'who do you think asked us to do this to you?'".

A human rights group in the coastal city of Mombasa, where Kenyan police reportedly interrogated him, said that they were not surprised by his allegations of mistreatment in custody.

"This is a trend," Khelef Khalif, a director of Mombasa-based Muslims for Human Rights (Muhuri) said. "They (the Kenyan security forces) use torture, especially in areas where there is suspected terrorist involvement," he added.

Adebolajo was picked up in northern Kenya in 2010 along with five other young men who were being monitored by the police on the suspicion that they were planning to join the al-Shabaab terror group in Somalia.

In live footage of Adebolajo's Mombasa court appearance that emerged yesterday, he is heard to say: "These people are mistreating us and we are innocent, believe me."

Aggrey Adoli, police chief in Kenya's Coast Province, dismissed the allegations, stating that "Kenyan police do not torture".

"There was no torture that took place, unless it was a cooked-up story," he added.

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