Algerian refused bail

Algerian refused bail

JANUARY 22: A Canadian judge on Thursday refused to release on bail an Algerian wanted in the United States on three charges linking him to a terrorist plot. There was ``serious and credible'' evidence that Moktar Hawari ``is part of a terrorist organization,'' and that his release would be against the public interest, said Judge Jean-Guy Boilard of Quebec Superior Court Hawari, 31, is one of two Algerian nationals charged with supplying materials to Algerian Ahmed Ressam, who was arrested in the United States last month trying to smuggle explosives from Canada.

Hawari and Abdel Ghani Meskini were indicted in a federal court in New York on Wednesday. An investigator with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Serge Haineault, had earlier said that Hawari was a member of the Armed Islamic Group (GIA), a militant Algerian group, and had also been arrested in Montreal in 1997 for credit card fraud. Haineault said that Ressam, when he was arrested, was carrying a credit card which he had obtained using the address of Hawari's handicrafts shop in Montreal.