Al Qaeda suspect being held in prison

Ahmed Brahim was last night being held in prison after High Court judge Ismael Moreno ordered that the suspected Al Qaeda financier be held unconditionally for being a member of a terrorist organisation. Brahim, who lived in Palma until a year ago, selling his luxury flat just two months before September 11, spent two hours before the judge in Madrid and denied having any relation with the international terrorist organisation. His daughter, Nora Brahim, after whom his Majorca yachting businesses were named, said yesterday in reference to Mamdouh Mahmud Salim, currently awaiting trial in the United States for his role in the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania, that she could not remember if Salim stayed with them at the Palma flat. Although Salim has admitted to the U.S. security services that he spent fours days in Palma in September 1998, a month after the Africa terrorist attacks. The security forces are accusing Brahim of having financed the 1998 embassy attacks and police are investigating his relationship with other key members of the Al Qaeda group. The police are confident that Salim stayed with Brahim in Palma, where he is also suspected of having used his yachting business as a front to move money for the terrorist organisation. Brahim was arrested at his Barcelona home last Sunday and police have confiscated all his computer equipment and records which investigators hope will not only lift the lid on his business “fronts,” but also shed some light on whether Brahim knew Mohamed Atta, one of the September 11 hijackers and ring leaders. Yesterday Brahim did admit to having accommodated a number of visitors in Palma, but they were all friends of a third party. Atta visited Spain twice last year and spent some time in Barcelona around the time that Brahim sold his Paseo Maritimo apartment. He is the nineteenth Al Qaeda suspect to have been arrested in Spain since September 11 and police believe he could prove to be the key to the terrorist organisation's operations in Spain.