Alleged Guadeloupe terrorist prompts security review in Australia

Thursday, November 6, 2003

SYDNEY Australia (AFP): Australia's Attorney General Philip Ruddock has launched a review of anti-terror powers after the deportation last month of Guadeloupe-born terror suspect Willie Virgile Brigitte, widely suspected of plotting an attack in Australia.

During five months in Australia, Brigitte, 35, married a former member of the Australian military who had converted to Islam.

A convert to Islam himself from the French Caribbean possession of Guadeloupe, Brigitte has ties to Islamic hardliners in Pakistan and Afghanistan, where he is thought to have fought.

The Sydney Morning Herald on Wednesday published extracts of an interview with Brigitte's wife, identifying her only by the initials KB. She denied any knowledge of the activities he has been accused of.

The couple married under Islamic law in August, the paper said. She denied that Brigitte married her only to stay in Australia.

"I know that's not true," she told the paper.

She said she entered the marriage "by the example of the Prophet" and suggested that the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) used his case to "stir trouble and create divisions" within the Muslim community.

Brigitte is now being held on terrorism charges in France, which has powers to detain terror suspects without charge for years if need be.

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