Two men who have been accused in planning to derail a passenger train have been arrested by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, authorities said on April 24. Canadian police have confirmed the plot has been linked to Al Qaeda. Nelson Mishler, a freshman majoring in biology from California, said, “It’s a good thing they stopped the attack for obvious reasons. The only good that could possibly come from their failure to stop said attack would be an awakened awareness and serious attitude toward the threat of terrorism. The same result could have come from merely exposing the plan.” The Associated Press reported, “The investigation surrounding the planned attack was part of a cross-border operation involving Canadian law enforcement agencies, the FBI and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Canadian police said the men never got close to carrying out the attack.”Chiheb Esseghaier, 30, and Raed Jaser, 35, were arrested and charged with “receiving support from al Qaeda elements in Iran” to carry out an attack and conspiring to murder people on a VIA railway train in the greater Toronto area, said Assistant Police Commissioner James Malizia, to CNN. Malizia said despite the allegation to ties with Al Qaeda, there was no evidence to suggest the attacks were state-sponsored. Iran released a statement to the United Nations saying, “Al Qaeda has no possibility to do any activity inside Iran or conduct any operation abroad from Iran's territory, and we reject strongly and categorically any connection to this story.” The Iranian U.N. mission denied the notion Al Qaeda operated in their borders and added that their position “against this group is very clear and well known.”The New York Times reported, “Police declined to identify what train or train line the men had planned to target or to describe how the derailment was to have occurred.” The suspected plotters were not Canadian citizens and authorities declined to identify their nationality.“The arrests were made shortly before Canada’s House of Commons began a debate on legislation that would expand the powers of police and intelligence agencies in suspected terrorism cases,” stated The New York Times.
Writer: Dylan-Sage Wilcox ~ Multimedia Journalist
