UN blacklists alleged Benghazi attack culprit

(AP) UN blacklists alleged Benghazi attack culprit
By PETER JAMES SPIELMANN
Associated Press
UNITED NATIONS
The U.N. Security Council has blacklisted an al-Qaida-affiliated militant and his network for allegedly being linked to the attack on the U.S diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya.

The council’s anti-terrorism committee has listed Muhammad Jamal and his Muhammad Jamal Network for running camps in Libya to train foreign terrorists and for being “reportedly involved in the attack on the U.S. Mission in Benghazi” on Sept. 11, 2012, according to Australian Ambassador Gary Quinlan, the chairman of the committee. The Security Council reviewed the work of its al-Qaida Sanctions Committee on Wednesday.

U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans were killed in the attack, which caused a political firestorm in the United States. Republicans in Congress have criticized the Obama administration’s handling of the attack and the level of security at the diplomatic outpost.

The listing requires all nations to freeze the funds and financial assets of the person and group, block their travel, and bar any military or technical advice or materials to them.

The U.S. State Department designated Jamal as a global terrorist in October, blocking any property Jamal or his network may have in U.S. jurisdiction and banning American citizens from engaging in any transactions that would benefit him.

The State Department said Jamal learned how to make bombs in the late 1980s from al-Qaida in Afghanistan and formed his own network _ with terrorist training camps in Egypt and Libya _ after being released from an Egyptian prison in 2011. In the 1990s, Jamal became a top military commander of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad _ then headed by Ayman al-Zawahiri, the chief of the al-Qaida network.