BERLIN: German prosecutors said Monday they are seeking the handover of the Islamic militant whose disclosures under US interrogation in Afghanistan helped trigger Europe's terror alert. A request for the transfer of the 36-year-old German of Afghan descent has been filed to the relevant US authorities with a view to prosecuting him in Germany, a spokesman for the federal prosecutor's office said. Germany accuses Ahmad Wali Siddiqui, who was arrested by the US military in July in Afghanistan, of membership in a foreign terrorist organization - the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan. Germany issued an arrest warrant for him in April, the spokesman said. The 36-year-old Siddiqui is believed to have been part of the Hamburg militant scene that also included key Sept. 11, 2001, plotters. German officials have said he left Germany in March 2009 to seek paramilitary training in Pakistan's lawless border region. Siddiqui is an old friend of Mounir el Motassadeq, who was convicted in Germany in connection with Sept. 11, and frequented the same mosque where the Hamburg-based plotters often met, German officials said last week. Richard Holbrooke, the US special representative for Pakistan and Afghanistan, said in Berlin on Monday that German officials had access to the man in US custody and that the two nations were in contact to evaluate the request for his handover. Hamburg security officials in August shuttered the Taiba mosque, known until two years ago as al-Quds, because of fears it was becoming a magnet for homegrown extremists. US officials say Siddiqui provided details on alleged al-Qaida-linked plots against Europe that prompted Washington to issue a travel alert earlier this month.
