Pakistan jails 5 Americans over terror plots - Jun 2010
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Detained American Muslims, center, are escorted by Pakistan police officers as they leave after appear in an anti terrorist court in Sargodha, Pakistan on Jan. 4.
SARGODHA, Pakistan - A Pakistan court convicted five American men on terror charges Thursday and sentenced each to 10 years in prison. The five young Muslim students from the Washington, D.C. area, were detained in December in Pakistan's central city of Sargodha, 120 miles southeast of Islamabad, after their families reported them missing.
Prosecutors said they presented evidence such as e-mail records and witness statements proving that the men were plotting terror attacks in Pakistan and conspired to wage war against nations allied with it, a reference to Afghanistan, where the men were alleged to have been traveling. The men have been identified as Ramy Zamzam of Egyptian descent, Waqar Khan and Umar Farooq of Pakistani descent, and Aman Hassan Yemer and Ahmed Minni of Ethiopian descent. One allegedly left behind a farewell video in the United States showing scenes of war and casualties and saying Muslims must be defended.
The five men told the court earlier that they only wanted to provide fellow Muslim brothers in Afghanistan with medicine and financial help, and accused the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation and Pakistani police of torturing them and trying to frame them.
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How are we ever going to "win" in Afghanistan, if we can't even prevent our own people from joining the opposition? Maybe we should focus on "winning the hearts and minds" of the people in America first.