By Chuck Hustmyre

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October 4, 2007

VIENNA, Austria (Crime Library) --Austrian police arrested a man early Monday afternoon just moments after his backpack full of explosives and nails set off a metal detector at the security checkpoint he was trying to pass through before entering the embassy. Although Austrian officials have not released the full name of the man, Crime Library has received information that identifies him as 42-year-old Asim Cejanovic, originally of Bijeljina, Bosnia-Herzegovina. Austrian officials would identify the man only as Asim C.

Ethnic Muslims comprise almost 50 percent of the population of Bosnia-Herzegovina, part of the former Yugoslavia.

Backpack Crime Scene at U.S. Embassy in Austria

Tuesday, despite the fact that police found a Muslim prayer book in the backpack that Asim C. tried to sneak into the American Embassy, along with at least two explosive devices that appeared to be hand grenades and a pound of nails, Doris Edelbacher, chief spokeswoman for Austria's federal counterterrorism office, downplayed any link between Asim C. and radical Islam.

Erik Buxbaum, Austria's public security manager, said, "It's too early to talk about Islamic radicals."

Austrian Public Security Manager Erik Buxbaum

Other officials suggested Asim C. might have psychiatric problems, for which he may need to receive treatment while in custody.

Police arrested a second suspect late Monday, whom they identified only as Mehmed D., a 34-year-old Bosnian immigrant. According to officials, Asim C. and Mehmed D. know each other and both live in the city of Tulln, about 15 miles west of the Austrian capital.

Tulln, Austria

A police search of Asim C.'s residence in Tulln following his arrest turned up a pound of plastic explosive of a type commonly used in the former Yugoslavia.

A source, who asked not to be identified but who is a former member of the Austrian military and a former government official, told Crime Library that Asim Cejanovic is a Muslim refugee from war-torn Bosnia. He arrived in Austria several years ago and settled in Tulln, where he now lives with his wife and three children.

Namaz u Islamu

The source told Crime Library that the Muslim prayer book Cejanovic had in his backpack when he was arrested was titled Namaz u Islamu. Only about 2,000 copies of the book were published, according to the source, by a group known as UMMET, which translated into English stands for The Society to Promote Islamic Culture in Austria.

UMMET, again according to the source, is connected to a controversial Islamic teacher in Austria named Amir Zaida. UMMET has also been linked to an organization known as Active Islamic Youth, a Bosnian-based group that follows the Wahhabi branch of Islam and is trying to bring sharia law to Bosnia. Sharia is the strict and violent firebrand code of Islamic justice. UMMET also has connections to Vienna's Al Tawheed mosque, run by Imam Vehid Podojak, who has reportedly called for the imposition of sharia law in Austria.

Like their counterparts in the United States so often do after a lone Muslim launches an attack against non-Muslims, officials in Austria are dismissing any link between Islamic terrorism and Monday's apparent attempted bombing at the U.S. Embassy in Vienna.

Beginning almost immediately after police arrested the suspect, officials were quoted as saying the man seemed "confused." They said he spoke in broken German during initial interrogation and that his answers were rambling.

"Confused" was the same word U.S. authorities applied to third-year medical student Houssein Zorkot in Dearborn, Mich. Zorkot ran a jihadist Web site dedicated to the terror group Hezbollah until police nabbed him in a park last month dressed in military garb, with his face painted black, and toting a loaded AK-47.

Houssein Zorkot - Dearborn, MI Jihadist

Despite the connections between a man who tried to sneak a backpack full of explosives into the U.S. Embassy and militant Islam, Austrian authorities are for some reason reluctant to connect the dots and call the would-be backpack bomber — whether crazy or not — a terror suspect.

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Contact  Chuck Hustmyre at chuck3174@yahoo.com

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