U.S. to List Libyan Groups and Militant Tied to Benghazi Attack as Terrorists
The
State Department is moving to apply the terrorist designation to two
Libyan organizations and one militant believed to have played a role in
the deadly attack on the American diplomatic mission in Benghazi in September 2012, senior United States officials said on Wednesday.
The
terrorist designations would be the American government’s first formal
public accusations of responsibility for the attack, which killed
Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans.
Senior
United States officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity because
the State Department has not yet made the designations public, said
they would apply to Ahmed Abu Khattala, a Benghazi militant described by
witnesses as having played a role in directing the assault, as well as
to an allied group, Ansar al-Shariah of Benghazi, whose fighters were
seen participating in the attack. In interviews, Mr. Abu Khattala has
denied belonging to Ansar al-Shariah, but the terrorist designation was
expected to describe him as a leader of the group. Witnesses said he
visited its headquarters the night of the attack. The designation is
expected to say that members of the group were involved in it.
The
designation was also expected to apply to Ansar al-Shariah of Derna,
Libya, which is described as a separate militant Islamist organization,
the officials said. The designation was expected to assert that its
fighters were also involved in the attack. They may have been identified
by witnesses or security camera footage. Derna is a coastal city known
as a center of Islamist militancy, a few hours’ drive from Benghazi in
eastern Libya.
The designations were disclosed privately to Congress last Friday. Elements of the State Department action were reported on Wednesday by The Washington Post, and they were expected to be released publicly by the State Department on Friday.
Many
people from Derna, including Islamist fighters, are in Benghazi on any
given day, and there is no evidence that the fighters from Ansar
al-Shariah of Derna who were involved in the attack came to Benghazi for
that reason, according to officials familiar with the intelligence
reports, the criminal investigation and the terrorist designations.
The
designation was also expected to apply to Sufian bin Qumu, a former
driver for a company controlled by Osama bin Laden and a former inmate
at the United States military prison in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. He is
identified as a leader of Ansar al-Shariah in Derna, but officials
briefed on the designations and the intelligence reports said that there
was no evidence linking him to the attack.
By
mid-2013, however, Mr. Qumu was known to have contacts and
communication with Al Qaeda or its regional affiliates, such as Al Qaeda
in the Islamic Maghreb, according to people knowledgeable about the
intelligence.
In
a recent interview with Libyan television, Mr. Qumu called for the
imposition of medieval Islamic punishments like severing the hands of
thieves or whipping alcohol drinkers — describing such measures as an
obvious step that all but drunks or thieves would support. In a radio
interview in 2012, he said he hoped that “an Islamic state is
established here” like the one he knew in Afghanistan under the Taliban.
If he described Guantánamo Bay, he told listeners, “You will not hold
back your tears.”
A
nephew of his, known as Abu Nas, was believed to have run a primitive
training camp near Derna for Islamist fighters, presumably bound for
fighting elsewhere. In May 2013, the nephew was killed while driving a
car loaded with explosives that accidentally detonated in Benghazi,
according to officials briefed on United States intelligence.
In
addition to the Libyan militants, the State Department is also moving
to apply the terrorist designation to a Tunisian militant leader,
Seifallah ben Hassine, as well as a separate Tunisian organization also
known as Ansar al-Shariah. That name is relatively generic and means
Supporters of Islamic Law.
The
designations have legal consequences, allowing the United States to
freeze assets belonging to designated individuals or groups, or to block
Americans from doing business with them.
Federal
investigators have filed sealed criminal complaints against about a
dozen suspects in the Benghazi attack, but the Libyan authorities have
said they are unable to arrest or prosecute the suspects because of the
government’s lack of a strong military or police force.
The
United States military has drawn up its own plans to apprehend Mr. Abu
Khattala in a commando raid, but the Obama administration has so far
held back from carrying them out, in part for fear of toppling Libya’s
fragile transitional government.
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