"We Don't Know What Your Name Is"
The official identification of the terrorist masterminds has been handled as if it
doesn't really matter who attacked American civilians on our own soil.
Reported differences of height, obvious discrepancies in signatures, questions
about place of residence and access to training -- all these issues have been
overlooked or dismissed.
Ramzi Yousef, the mastermind of the 1993 World Trade Center bomb, has
been officially identified as Abdul Basit Karim, a Pakistani born and raised in
Kuwait. This identification was questioned by the lead investigating agency, FBI-
NY, because of the discrepancies in his identifying documents. Judge Kevin
Duffy, who had presided over both of Yousef’s trials for terrorist activity, summed
up the situation at Yousef’s sentencing hearing: “We don’t even know what
your real name is.”
Abdul Basit Karim is the name shown on the Pakistani passport on which Yousef fled on the
night of the WTC bombing. He had obtained that passport in New York, at the Pakistani
consulate, by submitting an application to replace a lost passport. Significantly, that application
has no signature, and neither does the Iraqi passport Yousef used to enter the U.S. There are
thus no , other than the two on this page. The two signatures reproduced here are thus
the only signatures for Ramzi Yousef that exist in the public record.
Along with the application Yousef submitted photocopies (not originals) of two Pakistani
passports in the name of Abdul Basit Karim, from 1984 and 1988 (shown below). All these
documents were admitted into evidence at Yousef's trial and thus entered into the public domain.
These two photocopied passports show glaring discrepancies. (1) The signatures bear no
resemblance to one another. (2) The family place of origin (the "permanent address") changes
from Karachi to Baluchistan. (The permanent address is not the individual's place of residence,
and it is likely that Karim, born and raised in Kuwait, had never lived in either of those places.)
The most straightforward interpretation of the discrepancies in the two
photocopied passports is that the more recent one (1988) had been adapted
for a different individual, someone with a different signature and a different
ethnic background (Pakistan Baluch, rather than Pakistani).
In addition to these discrepancies, there is the problem of Karim's and Yousef's
physical descriptions — a difference in height of five inches. In 1988 (age 20), his
height is 5'7", according to his passport; in 1992 (age 24), he is six feet tall, according
to his U.S. immigration report. (Documents on next page.)
The sole piece of evidence establishing the identity of Ramzi Yousef is the fact that his
fingerprints match those provided in Abdul Basit Karim's immigration file in Kuwait. Fingerprints
cannot be falsified; but files have been known to be tampered with (as Karim's file was in fact) —
and those Kuwaiti files had been in the custody of Iraqi intelligence for XXX months in
1991, during the Iraqi occupation.
Abdul Basit Karim's Passports
Continued on next page: Discrepancies of height
The official identification of the terrorist masterminds has been handled as if it
doesn't really matter who attacked American civilians on our own soil.
Reported differences of height, obvious discrepancies in signatures, questions
about place of residence and access to training -- all these issues have been
overlooked or dismissed.
Ramzi Yousef, the mastermind of the 1993 World Trade Center bomb, has
been officially identified as Abdul Basit Karim, a Pakistani born and raised in
Kuwait. This identification was questioned by the lead investigating agency, FBI-
NY, because of the discrepancies in his identifying documents. Judge Kevin
Duffy, who had presided over both of Yousef’s trials for terrorist activity, summed
up the situation at Yousef’s sentencing hearing: “We don’t even know what
your real name is.”
Abdul Basit Karim is the name shown on the Pakistani passport on which Yousef fled on the
night of the WTC bombing. He had obtained that passport in New York, at the Pakistani
consulate, by submitting an application to replace a lost passport. Significantly, that application
has no signature, and neither does the Iraqi passport Yousef used to enter the U.S. There are
thus no , other than the two on this page. The two signatures reproduced here are thus
the only signatures for Ramzi Yousef that exist in the public record.
Along with the application Yousef submitted photocopies (not originals) of two Pakistani
passports in the name of Abdul Basit Karim, from 1984 and 1988 (shown below). All these
documents were admitted into evidence at Yousef's trial and thus entered into the public domain.
These two photocopied passports show glaring discrepancies. (1) The signatures bear no
resemblance to one another. (2) The family place of origin (the "permanent address") changes
from Karachi to Baluchistan. (The permanent address is not the individual's place of residence,
and it is likely that Karim, born and raised in Kuwait, had never lived in either of those places.)
The most straightforward interpretation of the discrepancies in the two
photocopied passports is that the more recent one (1988) had been adapted
for a different individual, someone with a different signature and a different
ethnic background (Pakistan Baluch, rather than Pakistani).
In addition to these discrepancies, there is the problem of Karim's and Yousef's
physical descriptions — a difference in height of five inches. In 1988 (age 20), his
height is 5'7", according to his passport; in 1992 (age 24), he is six feet tall, according
to his U.S. immigration report. (Documents on next page.)
The sole piece of evidence establishing the identity of Ramzi Yousef is the fact that his
fingerprints match those provided in Abdul Basit Karim's immigration file in Kuwait. Fingerprints
cannot be falsified; but files have been known to be tampered with (as Karim's file was in fact) —
and those Kuwaiti files had been in the custody of Iraqi intelligence for XXX months in
1991, during the Iraqi occupation.
Abdul Basit Karim's Passports
Continued on next page: Discrepancies of height
Examine
the files:
the files:
Nothing but
the evidence
about Iraq’s
involvement
with anti-US
terrorism.
the evidence
about Iraq’s
involvement
with anti-US
terrorism.
| The Passports of Abdul Basit Karim |
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