– ABDUL BASIT MAHMUD ABDUL KARIM – RAMZI YOUSEF

 

Ramzi  Yousef was born, on 05/20/1967, and raised in Kuwait. He is the son to a Pakistani father and Palestinian mother, nephew to Khalid Shaik Mohammed . Ramzi  Yousef absorbed deep hatred for Israel and USA. In 1989 graduated as Electrical Engineer from West Glamorgan Institute, Wales, UK. In 1990 Ramzi  Yousef traveled several times to USA. He worked as an engineer in Kuwaits’ national computer center. Ramzi  Yousef escaped Kuwait at Iraqi’s incursion, on 08/02/1990. In summer 1992 Ramzi  Yousef finished sabotage course in Afghanistan, in an Al Qaeda training camp.

Ramzi  Yousef arrived in USA, on 09/01/1992, with a well falsified Iraqi passport. Together with Ramzi  Yousef arrived Ahmed Ajaj , a Muslim activist who was detained in the airport on arrival under suspicion of terrorism.

Ramzi  Yousef planned, assembled and activated the explosive lorry in the first attack on World Trade Center (WTC), the “Twins”, on 02/26/1993. After the explosion Ramzi  Yousef dictated on the phone an announcement addressed for the media to one of the activists in Al Farook Mosque, Brooklyn, New York, which said, among other things, “…next time we shall be more precise”.

Ramzi  Yousef escaped form USA to the Balkans, stayed for a short period of time in Bosnia and returned to Pakistan and Afghanistan. Throughout 1993, while stationed in Lahore, Afghanistan, Ramzi  Yousef trained his friend Abdul Hakim Murad in assembly of explosive charges. An improvised charge exploded in his hands causing Ramzi  Yousef partial eye damage.

At the beginning of 1994 Ramzi  Yousef moved to Thailand in order to initiate a car explosion charge at the Israeli embassy in Bangkok, but as the attempt was uncovered he returned to Pakistan and dealt with recruiting activists for Bojinka Plot, one of them was a South African Muslim Istaique Parker through which Ramzi  Yousef tried to smuggle a small explosive charge in a toy on a flight to Bangkok.

Istaique Parker flinched, regretted his involvement and became later an informant to the USA. Following a CIA hunt for Ramzi  Yousef and a prize of 2 million dollars for his head, he moved to the Philippines and became active in the local Abu Sayyaf terrorist group, while using falsified Moroccan identity documents under the name Naji Awaita Hadad.

At the 12/01/1994 while in the Philippines, and as a check towards Bojinka Plot scheme, Ramzi  Yousef purchased a flight ticket on flight 434, Philippines Airlines  to Tokyo, through Cebu City in east Philippines, under an Italian name of Armaldo Forlani and hiding an likuid explosive charge in the heel of his shoe. Ramzi  Yousef extracted the charge from his shoe heel in airplanes’ toilet with a kassio watch and stuck it under his seat. He left the plane in Sabo and his seat was taken by a Japanese person – Haruki Ikegami – who was killed as a result of explosion while the airplane was in the air. The pilot managed to land in Japan even though there was a hole in the planes’ floor.

 In Manila, 01/06/1995, while Ramzi  Yousef prepared explosives with his friend Abdul Hakim Murad in a hideout, mixing fluid components for a charge, when an accident happened causing thick smoke. This alarmed police forces who arrested Abdul Hakim Murad and confiscated Ramzi  Yousef s’ private computer.

The arrest uncovered a plot to abduct and detonate 11 planes in the air, named Bojinka Plot and also to murder the Pope on his planned visit to the Philippines on 01/15/1995. Ramzi  Yousef escaped back to Pakistan through Singapore. In Pakistan he was detained after a long follow up on 02/07/1995 in a building belonging to Pakistani intelligence – ISI, close to Islamabad.

Ramzi  Yousefs’ next door neighbor was Khalid Shaik Mohammed who managed to escape. After a short while Ramzi  Yousef was extradited to USA.

Ramzi  Yousef was sentenced by a New York court of law on 11/08/1998 to 240 years imprisonment in solitude also for his part in Bojinka Plot.

 

 

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