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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Muslim shifts to guilty plea, will help with probe of plot

Josh Meyer Los Angeles Times

ALEXANDRIA, Va. – A prominent American Muslim activist pleaded guilty Friday to illegally receiving money from Libya and agreed to cooperate in an ongoing investigation into an alleged Libyan plot to kill the leader of Saudi Arabia.

The guilty plea marked a dramatic reversal in the fortunes of Abdurahman M. Alamoudi, a naturalized U.S. citizen from Eritrea who acted as a liaison between the Muslim community and the Bush and Clinton administrations.

Judge Claude M. Hilton approved Alamoudi’s plea agreement with prosecutors at a brief hearing in federal court here. Alamoudi faced life imprisonment, but because he decided to cooperate, he now faces a maximum sentence of 23 years.

Court documents made public Friday offered the first official confirmation that U.S. authorities took seriously a disclosure by Alamoudi that Libyan leader Col. Moammar Gadhafi planned to destabilize the Saudi government by assassinating its de facto leader, Crown Prince Abdullah.

Last year, the Bush administration said it had helped pressure Gadhafi into agreeing to dismantle Libya’s nuclear weapons program. Gadhafi has been trying to negotiate Libya’s way off U.S. economic blacklists by promising to become an ally in the U.S.-led global counter-terrorism effort.

As those negotiations were under way late last year, Alamoudi told government investigators that Gadhafi was secretly engaged in a plot to assassinate Abdullah, apparently in or around the prince’s home near Mecca, Islam’s holiest city. The plot was uncovered late last year after four alleged plotters were arrested in Saudi Arabia and Egypt.

Any evidence linking Libya, particularly Gadhafi, to such a plot could undermine ongoing diplomatic efforts not only with Tripoli, but also with Saudi Arabia, U.S. officials said .

Last May, the Bush administration lifted sanctions prohibiting Americans from traveling to Libya or doing business there. U.S. officials had been moving toward taking Libya off the list of state sponsors of terrorism. Those efforts have been put on hold while authorities investigate the alleged assassination plot.

Adam Ereli, the deputy State Department spokesman, said Libya has formally renounced terrorism and provided helpful intelligence about ongoing plots.

“However, there remain outstanding concerns, of which this is one,” Ereli said. “And as long as those concerns are not fully addressed, there’s a limit to how far our relationship can go.”