Captured Qaeda Suspect Fires on Troops

MIT-trained Pakistani woman had been fugitive since 2003
By Clay Dillow,  Newser Staff
Posted Aug 5, 2008 10:32 AM CDT
Captured Qaeda Suspect Fires on Troops
Aafia Siddiqui, whom police say a possible al-Qaeda associate, is seen in the custody of Counter Terrorism Department of Ghazni province in Ghazni City, Afghanistan, on Thursday, July 17, 2008.   (AP Photo)

An MIT-trained Pakistani neuroscientist with suspected al-Qaeda ties has been charged with trying to kill American soldiers and FBI agents while in custody last month, the New York Times reports. Aafia Siddiqui, who disappeared in Pakistan in 2003, turned up in Afghanistan, where she was detained for loitering suspiciously outside a governor’s compound. She was found to be carrying documents on explosives-making and jars of unidentified substances.

The next day two FBI agents and two soldiers entered the police station where, unknown to them, Siddiqui was being held, unrestrained, behind a curtain. When one of the warrant officers set his M-4 rifle down, Siddiqui grabbed it and fired two errant shots before she was wounded and restrained. She is being arraigned in the US.
(More Islamic terrorism stories.)

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