LETTING THEM TALK DOES DEMYSTIFY THEM, NO?:

The Talkative Terrorist on Tape: Madrid Plot 'Was My Project' (ELAINE SCIOLINO and JASON HOROWITZ, July 10, 2004, NY Times)

Terrorists are not usually talkers. But the man who calls himself the mastermind of the March 11 train bombings in Madrid is an exception.

For nearly three months, the Italian police have eavesdropped on Rabei Osman Sayed Ahmed, "Muhammad the Egyptian" as the 32-year-old Egyptian is known. The contents of his conversations, both in custody in Milan and before his arrest last month, have provided the police with a mother lode of information about the secret world of a man who claims to have recruited suicide bombers and organized terrorist operations in the name of Islam.

Senior Spanish investigators believe that Mr. Ahmed played an important role in the Madrid bombings, which killed 190 people, and could indeed be the architect of the operation, although they are still searching for other leading suspects. The Italian authorities arrested Mr. Ahmed after his monitored conversations spoke of an imminent attack in an undisclosed location.

Dozens of pages of transcripts obtained by The New York Times and interviews with officials in Spain, Italy, Germany and France have shed light on Mr. Ahmed and his ability over the years to take on new identities, cross borders and avoid the police as he pressed his cause against the West. They also offer a case study of the challenges and frustrations Europe faces in monitoring radicals, routing out sleeper cells and prosecuting and convicting those they arrest.