The eight immigrants

By SUSAN ASCHOFF, Times Staff Writer

© St. Petersburg Times, published February 29, 2000

There are eight immigrants known to be detained due to secret evidence, according to court hearings, their attorneys and the National Coalition to Protect Political Freedom. They are:

Mazen Al-Najjar
Tampa
Held 2 years, 9 months

The 42-year-old Palestinian was arrested in Tampa on an expired visa after living in the United States for 16 years. The government says he is a threat because of his "association" with the Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

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He and his brother-in-law, Sami Al-Arian, a University of South Florida computer engineering professor, founded a think tank in Tampa in the early 1990s. Federal agents say the now-defunct World and Islam Studies Enterprise, or WISE, was a front for bringing Middle East terrorists into the country, including Ramadan Abdullah Shallah. Shallah, a one-time USF teacher and WISE employee, assumed leadership of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad in 1995.

Al-Najjar and his wife, Fedaa, 35, have three daughters who are U.S. citizens. Both have been ordered deported and are seeking relief in federal courts. A federal judge in Miami also has been asked to free Al-Najjar. A decision could come as early as March.

Anwar Haddam
Virginia
Held 3 years, 2 months

The member of the Algerian Parliament and the Islamic Salvation Front political party came to the United States in 1992 after he and other officials were ousted in a military coup in 1990. He has been sentenced to death, in absentia, in Algeria. The 45-year-old physics professor is not accused by the U.S. government of terrorism but as a "persecutor" who uses his speech to incite others. He was arrested after his request for asylum was denied. An immigration appeals panel later found Haddam eligible for asylum but sent his case back to an immigration judge to review the secret evidence.

Haddam's wife, Nassima, a doctor, has been granted asylum. The couple have four children.

Ali Yasin Mohammed Karim
Mohammed Karim
California
Held 3 years

Five of the six men known as the Iraqi 6 in press coverage of their case struck a deal with the U.S. government to get out of jail after years in detention on secret evidence. One refused. Dr. Ali Yasim Mohammed Karim (and his brother Mohammed Karim) go back to immigration court in April to fight for asylum. Ali Karim's attorneys now have hundreds of pages of once-classified evidence used to accuse the Iraqis as spies. The pages were released after protests by U.S. senators and one of the immigrants' attorneys, former CIA Director James Woolsey. Some of the evidence remains classified.

FBI agents and an informant have been subpoenaed to appear at the Kurdish doctor's hearing.

The five Iraqis who dropped their plea for asylum were reunited with their families and are living in the United States under FBI surveillance. They must leave the country when the State Department finds another country that will take them.

Harpal Singh
California
Held 2 years, 3 months

A political activist from India and a leader in the movement for a separate state for Sikhs, Harpal Singh came to the United States in 1993 after being arrested and tortured by the Indian government. The 42-year-old lawyer was arrested in the United States in November 1997 when federal agents said he and his wife, Rajvinder Kaur, 38, were threats. An immigration judge found the government's secret evidence lacking and ordered Singh's deportation withheld and granted Kaur asylum. The INS appealed.

The couple's 13-year-old daughter was left behind in India and cannot join her parents unless their cases are resolved. A 5-year-old son was born in the United States. Kaur is the first woman known to be involved in a secret evidence case. She has not been detained. Her attorneys say she is named only because she took phone messages for her husband.

Mohammed Mirmehdi
Meran Najad
Yousef Hamidi
California
Held 11 months

In a federal investigation known as Operation Eastern Approach, agents in the Los Angeles area last March arrested 29 immigrants for manufacturing and using phony documents, including passports to smuggle people into the country. Those arrested included eight Iranians the U.S. attorney's office labeled "terrorists." They are a threat to national security because of ties to the Mujahedin-e Khalq, or MEK, an Iranian group on the State Department's list of terrorist organizations, the government said. The men say they support democracy in Iran. Last year, 220 members of Congress called for MEK's removal from the list, calling it a legitimate resistance group.

Since government attorneys have not yet submitted classified evidence, the INS says these are not secret evidence cases. The Iranians' attorneys disagree: The government alleged the men were threats without having to show proof.

Four of the men got bail and one left the country. Mirmehdi, Najad and Hamidi are detained pending a hearing.

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