On Muhammad Atta, the accused in US September 11 events
Regional-USA, Politics, 10/3/2001

The London- based al-Hayat daily said in its Tuesday issue in a report from Damascus that the Egyptian young man Muhammad Atta was very tidy and very remarkable in his studies and researches during his stay in Syria.

The paper added that the weeks Muhammad Atta spent in Aleppo, to the north of Syria in 1994 did not indicate that he will be one of the main accused persons in the terrorist attacks in New York and Washington.

In news reports from Damascus al-Hayat said that Muhammad Atta was born in 1968. He went to Hamburg, Germany in 1992 after he studies architecture in one of the Egyptian universities. He got a scholarship, as a remarkable student, from Karl Deschberge and during his study in Hamburg he agreed with a German colleague named Volker Haut to make a field study on reviving Old Aleppo. Both Atta and Haut came to Aleppo in August 1994 to make the study and Atta only stayed in Aleppo for few weeks and he returned to Syria in December 1994 and made contacts with experts at old Aleppo antiquities and members in the committee of the project to revive old Aleppo. Aleppo was very smart in his specialization. He then headed for Cairo to make a research on the old city relating to the Fatimiate ( a certain period of the Egyptian history ) and at that time he was not a fundamentalist.

The paper added that the change appeared on Atta by the beginning of 1996 when he vanished for two years he spent in Afghanistan and then he returned back to Haburg having a " beard" and concentrating in his doings on charity works more than study. He got his "Master degree" for his assignment on Aleppo and Cairo.

Al-Hayat said that Atta came to Syria " clean" and he left it " clean," but he was changed in a certain place in the world.

Previous Stories:
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  Syria, Egypt's concerns towards the international alliance to fighting terrorism   (10/1/2001)
  Arab Americans in Orlando donate $50,000 to red cross fund   (9/29/2001)

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