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Arrested 'big bang' scientist charged with terrorism | A leading nuclear physicist associated with the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) has been charged
with terrorism offences by a Paris judge after investigators said that he offered
to work with the North African branch of al-Qaeda. According to a report in The
Times, Adlene Hicheur, who is of Algerian origin, was arrested last week with
his younger brother after intelligence agents intercepted his alleged Internet
contacts with al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. The physicist, who works at the
giant atomic collider at CERN (European Organisation for Nuclear Research), which
straddles Swiss and French territory, told the Islamic group that he was interested
in committing an attack, but had not begun any material preparation, according
to police sources. The sources added that Hicheur had acknowledged contacting
the militant organization, al-Qaeda. Judge Christophe Teissier, of the anti-terrorist
branch, ordered the French internal security service, the DCRI, to open an investigation
into the possible offence of "association with criminals in relation with a terrorist
enterprise". Judge Teissier placed the scientist under formal investigation and
ordered his detention. The arrest raised the possibility that Islamist militants
could be seeking nuclear weapons technology or planning to attack nuclear targets.
Hicheur is reported to have worked for the British Government's Rutherford Appleton
Laboratory (RAL) in Oxfordshire for about a year in 2005. He was placed under
surveillance by French officers last year after US intelligence services intercepted
internet messages he allegedly sent to contacts close to al-Qaeda in the Islamic
Maghreb. |
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