21.09.2001: 23^rd court day

Mousli's memory is jolted with regards to debts and planned attacks - the public prosecution promises to get the still missing 23 files to Berlin by next Monday

Today, the court and prosecution continue the interrogation of Tarek Mousli.

In relation to a loan of 40,000 DM Mousli contended that the loan in question had been a non-interest-bearing loan, which he had taken up from a friend in 1986 to finance a business he then held. When the Crown Witness explained that he never thought that he actually had to pay back the money, the associate judge Lechner commented: "that sounds absurd".

Mousli could not explain as to why his friend insisted on another debt acknowledgment in 1995, and why years later, he initiated a writ of execution. Similarly, the Crown Witness could not shed light on the question as to why his then girlfriend Karmen T. had given evidence to the effect that Mousli had described the relevant loan not as a form of real debt but as a means of "money laundering". In light of the fact that he had described these debts as "fictitious" during his interrogation by the Federal Office of Criminal Investigation (BKA) in 1999, Mousli today conceded that that had been a "rather unfortunate" ("nicht ganz glücklich") choice of words.

More inconsistencies appeared when the Crown Witness gave evidence with regards to his concrete involvement in RZ actions. First he explained that he had only taken part in three attacks. On query by the defence, he regained his memory with regards to his involvement in at least one other planned attack. Mousli only remembered yet another planned attack, in relation to which Karmen T. claimed that Mousli had told her about his involvement, as part of stories told to him by Lothar E.. He himself had not taken part in them, Mousli insisted.

Relevant evidence in the form of the documentation of far-reaching telephone interceptions between September 1999 and January 2000 is still not completely available to the court or the defence. 955 tapes which document the above interception have now been handed over. 23 folders with transcripts are supposed to be sent to Berlin next Monday.