AP News, May 21st, 2007
One of the FBI's most-sought terrorism suspects has surrendered to authorities in Yemen, more than a year after tunneling out of a prison there, a spokesman for the Yemeni Embassy said Monday.
Jaber A. Elbaneh lived in Lackawanna, N.Y., before leaving to train at Osama bin Laden's al-Farooq training camp in Afghanistan in 2001, according to a federal indictment in Buffalo, N.Y.
Six of his traveling companions _ dubbed the "Lackawanna Six" _ returned to the United States and were arrested in September 2002. All are serving sentences ranging from seven to 10 years after pleading guilty in 2003 to supporting terrorists.
Elbaneh never returned to the United States, authorities believe, traveling instead to his native Yemen to live with his wife and children.
Mohammed Albasha, a spokesman for the Yemeni Embassy in Washington, said in an e-mail to The Associated Press that Elbaneh had surrendered.
"He is in our custody and this is a big break through in the case of his prison break last year," Albasha wrote in the e-mail.
The FBI could not confirm that Elbaneh was in custody.
"We certainly do hope he is caught," FBI spokesman Richard Kolko said Monday.
The State Department issued a reward of up to $5 million for Elbaneh's capture in September 2003. He is wanted on a 2002 charge of providing material support to a terrorist organization.
Authorities believe Elbaneh surrendered to Yemen authorities in 2003, but U.S. officials said they received no official response to their request to turn him over. Last year, Elbaneh was among the 23 men who tunneled out of a Yemeni prison, and he has been on the run since then.
