Catch Me If You Can.(lack of evidence on terrorist activity in Germany)(Brief Article)

The months since September 11 have been rather inconvenient for Mamoun Darkazanli. Three days after the terrorist strike, a platoon of German investigators smashed down the door of the Syrian-born businessman's Hamburg apartment. They seized his cell phone, laptop, files and address book and interrogated him without benefit of counsel. When police showed him photos of suspected September 11 hijackers, Darkazanli admitted having seen some of them around a local mosque, but he denied any wrongdoing. Nevertheless, the Bush administration froze his financial assets, implicitly accusing him of helping to finance the Qaeda terror network. Germany and the European Union soon followed suit.

Still, Darkazanli has one consolation: the Germans have not arrested him or formally charged him with any crime. He remains a free man--just like two dozen or so other individuals who are subjects of unpublicized investigations by Germany's Federal Criminal Police (BKA) into the origins of the September 11 plot. None has been charged with any criminal offense, although about 10 of them, Darkazanli not included, are classed as high-priority investigative targets. U.S. and European law enforcers claim to have documentary evidence linking some major suspects to one or more members of the Hamburg terrorist cell.

Why are they still running loose? So far Germany has made hardly any arrests in the case, aside from Mounir El Motassadeq, a Moroccan student who had power of attorney over one hijacker's bank account. ...