Did Canada hire this guy?Meanwhile in Libya...
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- Top Libyan Rebel Leader Has Deep Al Qaeda Ties
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By Jean-Pierre Perrin
LE TEMPS/Worldcrunch
For U.S. intelligence services, the man who led the rebel assault on Tripoli, and is now the de facto military governor of the capital, is an old acquaintance. The CIA had tracked down the accused jihadist, and eventually captured him in Malaysia in 2003. The agency is believed to have then transferred him, in total silence, to a “top secret” prison in Bangkok.
At that time, Abdel Hakim Belhadj, identified under the name of Abu Abdallah al-Sadek, born May 1, 1966, was already known for his long history as a jihad operative. This career began in 1988 in Afghanistan, like many other Islamist activists.
However if the CIA wanted him, it’s first because he was one of the founders, and even the “emir” of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), a small highly radical organization, which prior to Sept. 11 had two secret training camps in Afghanistan. The CIA was extremely interested in one of them, Shahid Cheikh Abu Yahya, about 19 miles north of Kabul, where the LIFG welcomed volunteers who had links with Al Qaeda.
Osama Bin Laden’s organization had many Libyans among its leading members, including Abu al-Laith al-Libi, one of Al-Qaeda’s military chiefs who was killed in Afghanistan in 2008. In 2007, the LIFG was given the seal of approval by Ayman al Zawahiri, then Al-Qaeda’s number two, and current successor of Bin Laden at the helm of the network. The LIFG then called on Libyans to rebel against Gaddafi, the U.S. and the other “infidels” of the West.
After Afghanistan, Belhadj traveled to Pakistan and Iraq. In Iraq, where the Libyans are the second most numerous group of Islamist volunteers after the Saudis, he was said to be close to Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi, Al-Qaeda’s chief in that country until his death in 2006. In Bangkok, in 2004, after having long been questioned and possibly tortured by the CIA, he was handed over to the Libyan secret services.