n Algerian convicted of trying to carry out a terrorist attack in Los Angeles on the eve of the millennium celebration testified yesterday that he had received money and training at camps in Afghanistan that American officials say were run by Osama bin Laden.
Ahmed Ressam, the Algerian, described in detail his training in light arms, explosives, assassinations and techniques for blowing up "the infrastructure of a country." After more than six months of training in Afghanistan in 1998, Mr. Ressam testified, he returned to Canada with $12,000 in seed money to plot terrorist attacks against the United States, Islam's "biggest enemy."
In his testimony yesterday in Federal District Court in Manhattan, Mr. Ressam did not mention Mr. bin Laden, the Saudi exile charged with conducting a jihad, or holy war, against the United States and its allies.
But in describing the origins of his plan to set off a bomb at Los Angeles International Airport, he nonetheless confirmed the key outlines of the picture drawn by American intelligence of Mr. bin Laden's operations. He described a network of camps in which Algerians, Jordanians, Germans and others were trained and indoctrinated for terrorist missions around the world.
Mr. Ressam testified at the trial of Mokhtar Haouari, an Algerian accused of providing money and support for the plot to blow up the airport. In Los Angeles in April, Mr. Ressam was convicted of trying to bring explosives into the United States. He has since agreed to cooperate with prosecutors; his sentencing has been postponed to July 25.
Mr. Ressam's testimony, translated from Arabic by an interpreter, offered a rare insider's look at the design and attempted execution of a terrorist plot. His account depicted a decentralized structure in which militants were trained and given considerable latitude in selecting targets and missions.
In his testimony, Mr. Ressam said the camps were run by Abu Zubaida, the nom de guerre of a Palestinian whom American officials have identified as an important lieutenant to Mr. bin Laden.
American officials say Abu Zubaida reports directly to Mr. bin Laden and is in charge of recruiting for the camps. Mr. Ressam said Abu Zubaida arranged for his trip from Montreal to Afghanistan, providing him with Afghan clothes and an Afghan guide to take him from Pakistan to a camp called Khalden.
Mr. Ressam also described how, at the camps, he and others were made aware of orders to kill Americans that had been issued by Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, the blind Egyptian cleric who was convicted in 1995 of conspiring to blow up the United Nations and other landmarks in the United States. He is now serving a life sentence in federal prison.
Mr. Ressam recounted how and why he selected the Los Angeles airport as a target and how he planned to rehearse and carry out the bombing. The plot went awry on Dec. 14, 1999, when a border guard in Port Angeles, Wash., questioned him in a routine check. Mr. Ressam, who does not speak English well, panicked and tried to flee. He was arrested and the authorities found more than 100 pounds of explosives in his car.
Mr. Ressam said he had planned the operation for more than a year but was forced to improvise when two other Algerians in his terrorist cell were detained in Britain and others then backed out. He said he selected the Los Angeles airport because he had passed through there on a flight from Pakistan.
Mr. Ressam testified that he wanted to test security at the airport by leaving a luggage cart with a bag unattended.
Mr. Ressam said he was trained at two camps in Afghanistan, Khalden and Darunta. Both have been identified by American officials as integral parts of al-Qaeda, a terrorist group founded by Mr. bin Laden that is an umbrella organization for anti- American militants around the world. There was no mention of al- Qaeda in the testimony yesterday, but Mr. Ressam was asked whether Abu Zubaida belonged to a "terrorist organization."
"Yes," he replied.
The United States has been pressing Afghanistan, most of which is ruled by the Taliban, to close down the camps and evict Mr. bin Laden. The Afghans have refused and American officials recently warned the Taliban that they would be held responsible for any attacks against the United States organized from their country.
A senior Bush administration official said Mr. Ressam's account "demonstrates that Afghanistan, in fact, has turned into the most threatening terrorist sanctuary in the world today."
Mr. Ressam said he was among 50 to 100 men at the camp in Afghanistan. He described his training in light weapons and explosives and instruction in "urban warfare." Among the possible targets among "enemies' installations," he said, were power plants, airports, railroads and large corporations.
Later, he said, he went to another camp for training in explosives, and returned to Canada with ingredients including hexamine, a booster used in bombs, and glycol. He said he bought other components in Vancouver and made his own timing devices.
When asked why he chose an airport as a target, he said, "An airport is sensitive politically and economically."
After Mr. Ressam had outlined his plan, he was asked if he realized that many civilians would die. "Yes, I would try to avoid that as much as possible," Mr. Ressam replied.
"But no matter how you did that, many would die," said Joseph F. Bianco, an assistant United States attorney.
"Yes," Mr. Ressam said.
Mr. Ressam is the star witness against Mr. Haouari, whom he met in Montreal through friends in a circle of Algerian migrs. He agreed just a few weeks ago, as his sentencing date approached, to cooperate with the government.
Mr. Haouari is charged with providing money and support to Mr. Ressam, as well as bank fraud.
In testimony yesterday, Mr. Ressam, 34, began the story of a career that took him from a job in his father's coffee shop in Algeria to his arrest in 1999 with a cache of explosives in his rental car.
He described a life of petty crime in Montreal, where he arrived as an illegal immigrant in 1994 "to improve my life situation."
"I lived on welfare and theft," he said. He said Mr. Haouari was dealing in stolen checks and passports and sometimes worked with him.
Mr. Ressam said that when he returned to Montreal from Afghanistan, he had been assigned to work with several other Algerians from the camps on general instructions to meet in Canada, rob banks and use the money to finance "an operation in America."
When his comrades failed to arrive in Canada, he testified, he worked mostly on his own.
He said that at the time, he and Mr. Haouari were working on a plan for Mr. Ressam to open a shop as a way to get information for counterfeit credit cards. He had told Mr. Haouari about the terrorist training camp, he said, and Mr. Haouari expressed interest in going, too.
He testified however, that he did not give Mr. Haouari details of the plan or identify the target.
"No, no, for security reasons I didn't want to tell him," Mr. Ressam said.
