April 28, 2003
Gunman admits killing missionaries
___JIBLA, Yemen (BP)--The Yemeni man accused of gunning down three International Mission Board workers in a hospital testified in court he killed the Americans to defend Islam because he believed they were sterilizing Muslim women and trying to convert Muslims to Christianity.
___Abed Abdul Razak Kamel, 30, said he moved from the Yemeni capital of Sana'a to Jibla after he heard about missionaries working there at a Southern Baptist-run hospital, the Associated Press reported April 21.
___"I acted out of a religious duty ... and in revenge from those who converted Muslims from their religion and made them unbelievers," Kamel, who is suspected of links to Al Qaeda, said as his trial opened April 20.
___"They were also committing another corruption," he said, claiming he had learned that women were visiting the hospital to get sterilized, the AP said.
___"This is a violation of Islam," he told the court.
___An IMB spokesman responded any sterilization procedures at the hospital occurred only by written permission of both spouses.
___Hospital administrator William Koehn, physician Martha Myers and purchasing manager Kathleen Gariety were killed Dec. 30 when Kamel walked into the hospital with a semiautomatic weapon under his clothes and opened fire. Pharmacist Don Caswell was wounded.
___Kamel was arrested the day of the shooting.
___He testified in court that he coordinated the attack with Ali al-Jarallah, another Muslim extremist charged with gunning down a Yemeni leftist politician two days before Kamel's Jibla hospital attack.
___In court, Kamel said he had been planning the attack 18 months, scouting out the hospital by visiting there and asking questions about its work.
___Prosecutor Ibrahim al-Delemi asked for the death penalty, and Kamel's next court appearance was set for April 30.
___Al-Jarallah, a member of Yemen's militant Islamic Reform Party, refused to answer questions at his trial when it opened April 20 in Sana'a.
___He called his trial "a farce, a legal scandal." Yemeni security officials believe both suspects belong to a terrorist cell linked to Al Qaeda, the Associated Press reported.
___Audiotapes with the voice of Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden were seized by authorities at Kamal's house.
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