Hardi N., prime suspect in the criminal case involving an Arnhem terror cell, had no independent plans to commit a terrorist attack. His willingness to commit an attack was triggered by undercover agents of the AIVD, which N. provoked.
"Ultimately, therefore, the AIVD itself created this danger," N.'s lawyer Serge Weening argued in court in Rotterdam on Monday.
In June, the prosecution demanded 18 years in prison against 36-year-old N., who is on trial with five co-defendants. The prosecution believes that by rolling up the terror cell - in September 2018 - the Netherlands escaped a bloody jihadist attack similar to the one in Paris in November 2015.
"That sticks with the public," Weening said, "and if the prosecution says that, it must be true." The case, according to the counsel, was "finished" when images came out about a meeting between undercover police officers and the suspects, in a vacation home in Weert. There, weapons and bomb vests (disarmed by the police) were inspected. After the meeting in the bungalow, a special unit trapped and arrested the suspects.
Weening argued that N. was impressionable at the time and that his Islamic beliefs were strongly determined by "those with whom he talked about the faith." One of the undercovers talked to N. in such a way that he became convinced that as a "good Muslim" he should take up jihad in the Netherlands and was prepared to carry out an attack. "I was provoked and brainwashed," N. himself has previously said about this. N. was previously convicted of an exit attempt to the Caliphate proclaimed by Islamic State.
Without the AIVD's interference, N. would never have come this far, the lawyer said. The prosecution should have demonstrated, he believes, that there was no incitement but failed to do so. "What the prosecution has actually mainly done is to wave away that hypothesis and thwart all attempts by the defense to put its story across."
The entrapment should have consequences for the criminal case, Weening believes. The judge could declare the prosecution's case invalid, or disregard the evidence produced by the undercover action.
https://www.telegraaf.nl/nieuws/328841892/advocaat-aivd-lokte-hardi-n-uit-tot-maken-aanslagplannen
