From: "Stasi" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [Peoples War] Afghanistan: Five British Volunteers Killed In Attack On Mazar, Says Islamist Group _ Guardian Five British volunteers killed in attack on Mazar, says Islamist group ============================================= Reports of men who fought and died for Taliban http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,596388,00.html Vikram Dodd Saturday November 17, 2001 The Guardian A website designer who drove a BMW is one of five British Muslims an extreme Islamist group claims were killed fighting for the Taliban in the Afghan town of Mazar-i-Sharif. The claims came from al-Muhajiroun, which has been the source behind a string of reports that British Muslims have gone to the warzone to take up arms against British soldiers and their allies. None has so far been verifiable. Speaking in Islamabad, Hassan Butt, a representative of the group, said the five men were killed in the battle for the town. It fell last Friday to the Northern Alliance, which denies massacring hundreds of Taliban fighters. "Five of our British Muslim volunteers were martyred in Mazar-i-Sharif," Mr Butt said. They include Abdul Saleem, 25, from east London, Zulfikar Ahmed, 28, from Leicester, and Abu Waheed, 26, from Crawley. Mr Butt refused to identify the other two. The group says three of its volunteers were killed last month during US bombing raids. Previously there has been no trace of those British Muslims claimed by al-Muhajiroun to have fought for the Taliban. But official records do exist that confirm someone called Abdul Saleem had lived in a two-bedroom council flat in Whitechapel, east London. At the address Abu Yahya, also a member of the extreme group, says Saleem had lived there until March this year. Mr Yahya said he had first met Saleem three years ago after they both joined al-Muhajiroun. He said Saleem was single and worked as a contract website software developer. Among his clients was a City bank. He also drove a black BMW 5-series car. He had a brother who is a doctor in the US, another brother in Holland and another in Pakistan, who is there with his mother, said Mr Yahya. "He used to be very generous and friendly. He used to take people to dinner, and drive people around in his car," Mr Yahya said. Most of his spare time was spent helping al-Muhajiroun and Mr Yahya said that it was natural for Saleem to fight in Afghanistan against the American attack: "It did not surprise me that he went to fight with the Taliban. We see it as a divine obligation to help. "There's no better way to die than on the front line. Everybody is going to die including you and me, and Bush and Blair." Saleem regularly played football on Wansted Flats in east London, and used to support Liverpool when he was younger. He spoke with an east London accent and shuttled back and forth between London and Pakistan. Omar Bakri Mohammad, the UK leader of al-Muhajiroun - which has very little British Muslim support - said he had never heard of Abdul Saleem or any of the others claimed by Pakistan-based representatives to have died: "I don't know if the reports are true or not," Mr Mohammad said. "I don't know any of them." Last week a newspaper quoted an Abdul Salim, 24, also from Whitechapel, as having said he had trained for four months with al-Qaida in Afghanistan last year in sabotage and hand-to hand combat. He is reported to have said: "I think Bin Laden is an inspiration to Muslims. He is a man of a high-class family who is sleeping in a cave and giving all his worldly goods to Islam." Last month Geoff Hoon, the defence secretary, warned that any Britons returning after fighting against British forces could be prosecuted. Many Muslim leaders have attacked al-Muhajiroun's claims, saying they are damaging the interests of Muslims in the UK to serve their own extremist agenda. In London, the Foreign Office has made no efforts to verify the reports. A spokeswoman said: "We have no diplomatic presence on the ground, therefore we have nobody who can confirm the reports. If the families want, they can contact us, then we will of course talk to them. "If they've chosen to fight with the Taliban they're clearly taking up arms against British soldiers and their allies." � Russian authorities yesterday claimed they had arrested a Muslim British citizen on the borders of Chechnya on suspicion of terrorism. The man, reported to be called either John Beneni or John Domeni, was detained on Thursday with two others after they were discovered carrying explosives, radio equipment, an AK-47, grenades and ammunition. According to the police, the Briton was of Turkish origin. He gave a London address and claimed to be a journalist. _________________________________________________ KOMINFORM P.O. 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