Spain Tries 9/11 Plotters

The Associated Press reports on Spain's trial of accused 9/11 plotters:

The main suspect is Imad Yarkas, a 42-year-old father of six who, under the guise of being a used-car salesman, is alleged to have overseen a cell that provided logistical cover for Sept. 11 plotters like Mohamed Atta, believed to have piloted one of the two airliners that destroyed the World Trade Center

[. . .]

Two other suspects also are accused of planning the attacks. Moroccan Driss Chebli, 33, allegedly helped Yarkas arrange a July 2001 meeting in Spain attended by Atta and Sept. 11 coordinator Ramzi bin al-Shibh. Syrian-born Ghasoub al-Abrash Ghalyoun, 39, made detailed video footage of the World Trade Center and other landmarks while visiting the United States in 1997.

Those tapes were eventually passed on to "operative members of al-Qaida and would become the preliminary information on the attacks against the Twin Towers," Garzon wrote in a September 2003 indictment against the three men and 32 other suspects, including Osama bin Laden himself and other key members of al-Qaida.

The other 21 on trial are charged with terrorism offenses but are not directly linked to the Sept. 11 attacks.

The trial is the culmination of an eight-year investigation which determined that Muslim militants leading quiet lives as businessmen, laborers or waiters operated freely in Spain recruiting men for terrorist training in Afghanistan, preaching holy war and laundering money for al-Qaida operations.

Spain is only the second foreign country after Germany to try suspects in the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

We should learn a lot from this trial. In this audio report on today's Morning Edition, Jerome Socolovsky tells us the indictment is hundred of pages and there are thousands of pages of evidence.