2 men charged with supporting al-Qaida-linked terrorist group in Germany

Two men have been charged with supporting a terrorist organization, a radical Islamic group whose plans for attacking U.S. targets in Germany were foiled by authorities in 2007, federal prosecutors said Wednesday.

The men, identified only as Omid S., a German of Afghan background, and Huseyin O., a Turk, were not charged with involvement in that foiled plot, federal prosecutor's spokesman Frank Wallenta said. Instead, they were charged more generally on allegations they supported the Islamic Jihad Union, an offshoot of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, a jihadist group with ties to al-Qaida.

The men, both 27, face a possible 10 years in prison if convicted. Omid S. was charged Feb. 19 with membership in a foreign terrorist organization, while Huseyin O. was charged with supporting a foreign terrorist organization. Wallenta said he said he was not authorized to give out the names of their attorneys.

Both men have links to Adem Yilmaz, a Turk living in Germany who was charged with Germans Fritz Martin Gelowicz and Daniel Martin Schneider last year in connection with a foiled 2007 terrorist plot to attack U.S. and German targets in central Germany. Those three were arrested in September 2007.

In the plot case, Yilmaz and two others go on trial next month on allegations they stockpiled 1,600 pounds (725 kilograms) of highly concentrated hydrogen peroxide at a rented cottage in central Germany in preparation for their plot — enough to build bombs more powerful than those that killed 191 commuters in Madrid in 2004 and 52 in London in 2005, authorities have said.

But German authorities — acting partially on intelligence from the U.S. — had been watching the suspects and had covertly replaced the hydrogen peroxide with a dilute substitute that could not have been used to produce a bomb.

Omid S., one of the two recently charged, is accused of making contact with the Islamic Jihad Union through Yilmaz and procuring supplies for the group such as night-vision devices and a GPS unit at the end of 2006 and in early 2007. He then left Germany for training at an Islamic Jihad Union camp in the Pakistan-Afghanistan border area in May 2007, prosecutors said.

Before heading off, he gave Yilmaz his bank card and security code so the Islamic Jihad Union would have access to the funds, prosecutors said. On his way to the training camp, he gave the supplies to an Islamic Jihad Union member in Iran, prosecutors said.

Upon his return to Germany in October 2007, Omid S. continued to provide logistical support for the terrorist organization, prosecutors said.

Huseyin O. is also accused of obtaining supplies for the Islamic Jihad Union and trying to arrange through Yilmaz to train at a camp on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.

He was arrested while trying to enter Pakistan through Iran in June 2007.

Prosecutors allege that he also gave Yilmaz access to his bank account so that Yilmaz could collect unemployment insurance funds that Huseyin O. had applied for using false information before he departed for Pakistan.

Omid S. has been in custody since his arrest in Germany in September 2008, while Huseyin O. remains free as the two await trial, but must regularly report to authorities and is subject to other restrictions, Wallenta said.

No date was immediately set for trial.