European militants now get training in Pakistan

ULM, Germany — As al-Qaida regains strength in the badlands of the Pakistani-Afghan border, an increasing number of militants from mainland Europe are traveling to Pakistan to train and to plot attacks on the West, European and U.S. anti-terror officials say.

The emerging route, illuminated by alleged bomb plots dismantled in Germany and Denmark last month, represents a new and dangerous reconfiguration. In recent years, the global flow of Muslim fighters had shifted to the battlefields of Iraq after the loss of al-Qaida's Afghan sanctuary in 2001.

"There have always been people going to Pakistan, but it is more frequent now," said a senior French intelligence official who, like others interviewed for this report, spoke on condition of anonymity.

Unlike Iraq, where foreign fighters plunge quickly into combat, recruits in Pakistan are more likely to be groomed for missions in the West. Aspiring holy warriors drawn to the Pakistani-Afghan border region include European converts and militants from Arab, Turkish and North African backgrounds, investigators said.

In the past, the main threat from that part of the world has involved young men from Britain's large Pakistani diaspora targeting Britain and the U.S. In half a dozen plots since 2003, British operatives, trained in Pakistan, made contact with fugitive al-Qaida leaders and returned home to strike.

In contrast, extremists from North African and Arab immigrant communities in Germany, France, Spain and Italy have been more likely to join networks based in North Africa or the Iraq region.

But today, even small countries such as Belgium, Denmark and Switzerland have detected non-Pakistani extremists going to Pakistani training outposts, officials say.

In Spain, radical Pakistani Imams and recruiters are muscling into predominantly North African mosques, a senior Spanish anti-terror official said.

In Italy, Moroccan and Tunisian extremists communicate by Internet with extremists in Pakistan, an Italian anti-terrorism official said.

These new links, combined with the unprecedented plots against Germany and Denmark, show a gathering menace, the official said.

In the Danish case, the leader of an alleged cell was trained by al-Qaida in Pakistan in an apparent plot to kill Danish civilians, partly as revenge for the publication of caricatures of the prophet Mohammed, anti-terrorism officials say.

In the German case, police in September arrested three suspects accused of assembling 1,500 pounds of explosives materials for vehicle bombings near U.S. military bases. The three allegedly took orders from Islamic Jihad Union, an al-Qaida ally based in Pakistan.

The German case is a reminder of the loose, almost anarchic workings of a radical underworld; extremists need time, perseverance and initiative.

"It is very organic, not planned or structured," a German intelligence official said. "It's the chaos principle, just as al-Qaida has always been chaotic. It is about chance. No one sits somewhere in the Hindu Kush with a map and draws circles on it and says: This is where we have to send people."

It is believed that Fritz Gelowicz, the accused ringleader of the German plot, met a key contact at a Quranic school in Damascus, Syria, in 2005: a militant from the Baluchistan region of Pakistan who became the liaison to the camps, according to an anti-terrorism official.

In March 2006, Gelowicz and two other suspects trained at a camp in the lawless Waziristan region, according to Pakistani and U.S. intelligence provided to German investigators. Investigators say the training camp was located near the city of Mir Ali, which has seen heavy fighting in recent days as Pakistani forces clash with al-Qaida and Taliban militants. The suspects used a variety of contacts and routes. But they all entered Pakistan via Iran, German investigators say.

The attitude of Shiite Iran to Sunni al-Qaida has been ambiguous. Iranian authorities have arrested some al-Qaida figures and protected others, seeing al-Qaida as a useful weapon against the West, anti-terror officials say.

The role of the Quranic school in Syria raises similar questions. Several European investigations have identified schools in Damascus as busy gateways where foreign fighters, posing as students, make contact with operatives who help them join the Iraqi insurgency. That recruitment and logistical activity has the permission or involvement of Syrian spies, European investigators say.

As the plot gathered momentum early this year, a second wave of associates set off from Germany. But U.S. and German police had begun intense surveillance, and Pakistani police were on alert. During the first half of the year, Pakistani authorities arrested seven militants.