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Islamists charged in anti-US terror plot

German federal prosecutors charged on Tuesday three men accused of planning attacks on US citizens and interests, including US military installations.

Published: 2 September 2008 15:50 CEST

Islamists charged in anti-US terror plot

The suspects purchased several containers of hydrogen peroxide. Photo: DPA

The three men – two German converts to Islam and a Turk – were arrested last September. They had attended training camps in Pakistan and were stockpiling chemicals to make car bombs, prosecutors had said at the time. Authorities reportedly learned of the second plot thanks to US surveillance of internet communications between Pakistan and Germany.

The alleged plotters, all in their 20s, were believed to belong to the Islamic Jihad Union, a group with links to Al-Qaida.

A spokesman for the prosecutors office declined to give details on what the three had been charged with.

The men had over 700 kilos (1,500 pounds) of hydrogen peroxide, the same chemical used in the 2005 attacks on London’s transport system which killed 56 people, prosecutors had said, with the explosive power of 550 kilos of TNT.

Just before police arrested the three, drums containing the chemicals had been moved recently to a holiday home in the Sauerland area in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia which had been rented under a false name.

German police swoop on gang of foreign dating scammers

The Black Axe gang was involved internationally in “multiple areas of criminal activity”, with a focus in Germany on romance scams and money-laundering, Bavarian police said in a statement.

The dating trick was a “modern form of marriage fraud”, police said.

“Using false identities, the fraudsters for example signalled their intention to marry and in the course of further contact repeatedly demand money under various pretexts,” police said.

The money was subsequently transferred to Black Axe in Nigeria “via financial agents”, authorities said.

In the process, the gang used a “commodity-based money laundering” scheme where products, often with a seeming “charitable purpose” were bought and delivered to Nigeria.

Some 450 cases of romance scamming had been reported in the region of Bavaria in 2023 alone, with the damages rising to 5.3 million euros ($5.7 million), police said.

The suspects, who all held Nigerian citizenship and were aged between 29 and 53, were arrested in nationwide raids on Tuesday.

Law enforcement swooped on 19 properties, including both homes and asylum shelters, police said.

The Black Axe gang had “strict hierarchical structures under leadership in Nigeria” operating different territorial units, police said.

The group had a “significant influence” on politics and public administrations, in particular in Nigeria.

Globally, the gang’s main areas of operation were “human-trafficking, fraud, money-laundering, prostitution and drug-trafficking”.

Black Axe operated under the cover of the Neo Black Movement of Africa, an ostensibly charitable organisation used as “camouflage” for the gang’s structures.

The action against Black Axe was the first of its kind in Germany, police said.

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