Sudanese police exclude al-Qaida involvement in journalist killing

Sept 13, 2006 (KHARTOUM) — Sudanese police official denied the role of al-Qaida in the death of a journalist found beheaded on Wednesday 6 September. He said this unknown organization didn’t provide any evidence to support its allegations.

The Khartoum State senior prosecutor, Babekir Abdelatif, who is heading the investigation into the killing of the journalist Mohamed Taha, told al-Khartoum newspaper that the report attributed to al-Qaida on the responsibility of the killing, was a mere allegation at this stage until strong evidence to support becomes available.

A man purporting to lead a Sudan and African branch of al-Qaida claimed responsibility on Tuesday for the beheading of the journalist. Abu Hafs al-Sudani called the editor of al-Wifaq newspaper a “dog of dogs from the ruling party”, and accused him of insulting the prophet Mohammad.

Abd-al-Latif said that the said organization was unknown and had not presented any filmed evidence to support its allegation, as is the case with hard line organizations that carry out such actions.

This statement contradicts another one made on Tuesday by a Sudanese security official who did not exclude involvement of foreign hands to the assassination of a Sudanese journalist killed last week.

Director of Operations Department at the National Security and Intelligence service Maj. Gen., Abdelazim Al-Rufaie, in press statement Tuesday, did not rule out involvement of foreign hands in the assassination of journalist Mohamed Taha

Actually, analysts in Khartoum agree that the Sudanese government wants to use the decapitation of the Sudanese journalist as part of its “psychological war” against the deployment of the bleu helmets in Darfur region.

(ST)