Two men accused of planning to carry out an al Qaeda-supported attack against a passenger train traveling between Canada and the United States will make their first court appearance on Tuesday, police said.
The hearing in Toronto's
Old City Hall Court comes a day after the Royal Canadian Mounted Police
announced they had arrested 30-year-old Chiheb Esseghaier of Montreal
and 35-year-old Raed Jaser of Toronto.
The two men face charges
of "receiving support from al Qaeda elements in Iran" to carry out an
attack and conspiring to murder people on a VIA railway train in the
greater Toronto area, Assistant Police Commissioner James Malizia said.
"When I speak about supported, I mean direction and guidance," he said.
Despite the allegation of
links to al Qaeda in Iran, there was no evidence to suggest the planned
attacks were state-sponsored, Malizia said.
Iran vehemently denied the allegations that al Qaeda was operating inside its borders.
"Iran's position against
this group is very clear and well known," according to a statement
released by Iran's mission to the United Nations.
"Al Qaeda has no
possibility to do any activity inside Iran or conduct any operation
abroad from Iran's territory, and we reject strongly and categorically
any connection to this story."
U.S. Rep. Peter King,
chairman of the counterterrorism and intelligence subcommittee, said,
"As I understand it, it was a train going from Canada to the U.S."
But neither the Canadian authorities nor King identified the exact route of the targeted train.
Few details have been released
Authorities said the
suspects were not Canadian citizens, but declined to identify their
nationality or how long they had been in Canada.
Additional details may come to light during Tuesday's hearing.
Essenghaier has been a
doctoral student at the National Institute of Scientific Research at the
University of Quebec since 2010, Julie Martineau, the university
spokeswoman, said.
He was conducting
research on nanosensors, which are primarily used for medical treatments
or to build other nanoproducts, such as computer chips, she said.
"I cannot comment on any behavior issues. He seemed like a normal student," Martineau said.
There was no link
between the Canadian investigation and the Boston Marathon bomb attack,
an official with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police told CNN on condition
of anonymity.
Canadian authorities
were tight-lipped about the planned time frame of the alleged attack
except to say it was in the planning stage and not imminent.
"We are alleging these
two individuals took steps and conducted activities to conduct a
terrorist attack," Jennifer Strachan of the Royal Canadian Mounted
Police told reporters.
"They watched trains and railways in the greater Toronto area."
The alleged attack included a plan to derail a passenger train, she said.
The Canadian
Broadcasting Corporation quoted "highly placed sources" as saying the
suspects were under surveillance for more than a year.
Muhammad Robert Heft, a
Muslim community leader in Toronto, told CNN that a tip from a local
imam led to the probe. Heft, president of the Muslim social services
organization Paradise forever, cited the RCMP, which he said revealed the information during a briefing with local Muslim leaders Monday.
Heft said he didn't know the circumstances that led to the tip.
"We are supportive and
thankful that the RCMP did the investigation and was able to apprehend
the individuals before anything happened," Heft said. "We are pleased
that they took us in and explained what was going on."
The CBC reported that
the investigation was "part of a cross-border operation involving
Canadian law enforcement agencies, the FBI and the U.S. Department of
Homeland Security."
Terror plots
Al Qaeda has long
studied the possibility of attacks on railroad systems, seeing them as
cheap, relatively easy to carry out and with potentially devastating
results.
The organization and its
sympathizers have plotted attacks on railway systems in Spain and
Germany. More than 200 people were killed and 1,700 injured in an attack
that targeted several commuter trains in Madrid in March 2004.
In a document seized
during the raid in Pakistan that left Osama bin Laden dead was evidence
of an al Qaeda discussion to target rail lines in the United States, a
law enforcement official told CNN in late 2011.
According to the
document, al Qaeda members discussed as early as 2010 a plan to derail
trains in the United States by placing obstructions on tracks over
bridges and in valleys.
The plan, according to
the document, was to be executed to coincide with the 10th anniversary
of the September 11 attacks, though no specific rail system was
identified, the official said.
News of the arrests Monday came the same day Canada's parliament debated an anti-terrorism bill.
Traditionally, al Qaeda's membership is seen as Sunni-dominated and not Shiite.
As a result, al Qaeda and Iran have not been viewed as allies.
"We have very little intelligence on al Qaeda in Iran," King said.
What is known is that
bin Laden's son-in-law, Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, fled Afghanistan for Iran
after the fall of the Taliban in 2001.
According to U.S.
documents and officials, in addition to Abu Ghaith, other members of bin
Laden's inner circle ended up in Iran, including the formidable
military commander of al Qaeda, Saif al-Adel, and Saad bin Laden, one of
the al Qaeda leader's older sons who has played some kind of leadership
role in the group.
Saad bin Laden also
helped one of his father's wives and several of his father's children to
move from Pakistan to Iran, officials said.
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