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It's no secret Armenian
terrorists worked in conjunction with other terrorist groups, particularly the
Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). On this page, we'll examine how these
different terrorist groups or individuals interacted.
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
1) ASALA Bigwig
Hagopian with Israeli Blood on His Hands?
2) Carlos and the
Armenians
3) Terrorists and the Drug
Trade
4) Armenians Support Radical Moslems
5) Links Between Armenian and Islamic Terror
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| ASALA
Bigwig Hagopian with Israeli Blood on His Hands? |
The Armenian Reporter February 7, 1985, p. 1
HAGOP HAGOPIAN SAID TO HAVE BEEN PART OF 1972 TERROR
ATTACK AT MUNICH OLYMPIC GAMES
New York NY—Hagop Hagopian alias Mihran Mihranian and 'Mojahed' is said to have taken part
in the terrorist attack on Israeli athletes during the 1972 Olympic Games held in the West
German city of Munich, according to published reports in the French press.
Le Matin the influential Paris daily, based on unidentified sources, claimed last week that
Hagop Hagopian, the founder and leader of one faction of the Armenian Secret Army for the
Liberation of Armenia (ASALA), was among the Arab terrorists who staged an attack on the
living quarters of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympic Games. The attack was later referred
to as the “Munich Massacres," as the result of the killing of a number of these
athletes. In this connection, there have been consistent reports that Mr. Hagopian was first
active in the Palestine guerilla cause and then in 1975 founded ASALA with the cooperation
of a few Armenian young men in the Lebanese capital of Beirut.
The French paper identifies Mr. Hagopian as Bedros Ohanesian, an Armenian who was born in
the Iraqi city of Mosul. He is described as 38 years old, short, on the heavy side and with
a dark complexion. The paper said Hagopian’s mother was not Armenian, making him only half
Armenian. Le Monde added that up to 1982, Hagopian operated out of Beirut, Lebanon, but
escaped from the country when Israeli forces entered the city. It was about this time that a
statement issued by ASALA claimed that Mr. Hagopian was dead of wounds suffered during a
bombing by the Israeli Air Force, although it is generally believed that the mysterious
leader is alive and well and presently is residing alternately in Damascus, Syria, and
Athens, Greece. The paper also noted that the socialist government of Prime Minister Andreas
Papandreou and his P.A.S.O.K. panty accepted the Armenian underground leader with “open
arms’ and are stilling providing him with assistance simply because of Greece’s
traditional enmity with Turkey.
Le Matin further adds that ASALA derives only a small portion of its expenditures from
wealthy Armenians who support the cause, with the rest coming either from other sources on
from proceeds of an involvement in drug trafficking. The paper asserts that Bulgarian
authorities also assist ASALA in obtaining all types of weapons that are used against
Turkish targets and diplomats.
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Carlos
and the Armenians
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The Nation, June 22, 1985, p. 759.
COLOMBIA: THE CARLOS CONNECTION
Carlos, the notorious international killer, surfaced on Spanish television recently in
an interview filmed at a Colombian hide-out. The Venezuelan fugitive was allegedly the
brains behind numerous terrorist spectaculars, including the massacre of Israeli
athletes at the 1972 Summer Olympic Games in Munich.
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Carlos the
Jackal; alleged to
have killed over 80 |
Apparently having forsaken the beleaguered
Palestine Liberation Organization, Carlos has become involved with Armenians seeking
to avenge the genocide suffered by their forebears at the hands of the Turks. In the
interview he told viewers, “We have links with the Armenian terrorist organizations.
We help each other in every way and we collaborate closely.’
With characteristic immodesty, Carlos also claimed that his operatives totally control
the South American drug traffic. He insisted that dealing narcotics should not be
considered a crime because Americans need drugs to cope with their lives. His primary
motive, however, seemed to be raising money to finance his revolutionary activities.
Drug dealing, Carlos said, “is our most effective weapon, we can say it is our
nuclear weapon. The narcotics trade enables us to continue our struggle against
imperialist forces.’
It seems his new colleagues did not approve. “My Armenian friends at first disagreed
with me on this issue and they resisted me,’ he explained. “I was even tried
before a court they set up, but I was found innocent.’ If Armenian extremists have
in fact embraced Carlos, it may bring them more headlines, but little else. Carlos’
previous clients have nothing to show for his alleged efforts on their behalf.
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| Terrorists and the Drug Trade |
Mark S. Steinitz, “Insurgents, Terrorists and the Drug Trade,” The Washington
Quarterly, Volume 8, Number 4, Fall 1985, p. 145.
INSURGENTS, TERRORISTS AND THE DRUG TRADE
Armenian terrorists operate in numerous countries, but they frequently are based in Lebanon,
especially Beirut, where members of the Armenian community figure prominently~in the drug
traffic. As the French press recently assented, it seems likely that at least some of these
drug profits find their way into terrorist coffers.
In 1980 Noubar Sofoyan, an Armenian drug smuggler with Lebanese citizenship, was indicted in
the U.S. for heroin smuggling. Sofoyan had been arrested in Switzerland in 1976 for
allegedly helping fund right-wing Armenian terrorists who bombed a Turkish installation in
Zurich. In 1981 he was arrested in Greece on drug changes, but extradited to Lebanon where
he was released, most likely because of pressure exerted on the Minister of Justice.
Also in 1981, Swedish police arrested a group of Armenian narcotics smugglers who were also
in possession of documents and publications linking them to a leftist Armenian terrorist
group, the Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (ASALA). The smugglers were
also linked to Armenian traffickers in the United States. Although the Swedes were never
able to prove that the arrested traffickers had passed money to terrorists, ASALA issued
several threats against Swedish interests on behalf of the jailed drug dealers and may have
been behind an unsuccessful attempt to help one of them escape custody.
In early 1983 the Turkish press, citing Interpol sources, claimed that nine kilograms of
heroin seized on Cyprus belonged to a Greek smuggling ring that helped fund ASALA. The
Turkish press also claimed that one of the ASALA terrorists who participated in the June
1983 attack on the Istanbul covered bazaar, later hid at the home of a drug smuggler.
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Armenians Support
Radical Moslems
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The Armenian Reporter, January 17, 1985.
ARMENIAN TERROR GROUP SUPPORTS RADICAL MOSLEMS
Source- BEIRUT, Lebanon—A leftist Armenian group earlier in the week, declared full
support for Jihad Islami, an extremist organization that has claimed several
anti-Armenian (sic) bombing attacks and gun-point abductions in Lebanon oven past few
months. The Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (ASALA), expressed its
support for the radical Lebanese group for its revolutionary activities in a statement
which was distributed to Western wine services here. The statement said Jihad Islamic
organization, which translates as “Islamic Holy War,” with its revolutionary
activities “has brought new momentum to the righteous struggle of oppressed people
of the Middle East and the struggle for the liberation of Western Armenia from the
fascist Turkish regime.” The statement said the struggle for the liberation of
Armenian lands was an inseparable part of the righteous struggle of the Armenian
people.
“Jihad Islami” is believed to have been composed of radical Shiite Moslems, who
are loyal to Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini. The group has also maintained close links
with other such radical organizations, including the “party of God” which has
claimed the bombings of the U.S. Embassy first in West Beirut, and then in East
Beirut.
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| Links Between Armenian and Islamic Terror |
ARMENIAN TERRORISM’S LINKS TO ISLAMIC TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS
Associated Press Wire Service, December 31 1985
BEIRUT, Lebanon (AP)—The terrorist group Islamic Jihad, which claims to hold six
Americans and four Frechmen hostage in Lebanon, said today it would carry out more
kidnappings and suicide bombings against Americans in 1986. The shadowy group,
believed to be made up of Shiite Moslem zealots loyal to Iran, also threatened in an
English-language statement to strike at Israeli targets “all oven the world.”
The statement, mailed to a western news agency in Beirut, said the group’s high
command made a decision to continue the attacks at an extraordinary Nov. 25 meeting.
It did not say where the meeting was held on provide any more details about it.
It singled out Turkey as a “tool for implementation” of Israeli and U.S. policies
in the Middle East and threatened terrorist attacks against Turkish embassies in
Lebanon, Iraq, Iran, Egypt, Libya, West Germany, Austria, and France.
It warned Turkey to “stop supporting the U.S. and Israeli policies, to cut short its
own subversive activities against the Arab nations, and liquidate the spy dens at its
embassies, subsidiaries of the C.I.A. and the (Israeli Secret Service) Mossad.”
The statement did not list any specific Turkish activities.
“The High Command of the Islamic Jihad organization decided: The merciless punitive
operations against American imperialism will continue until the United States stops
interfering into the home affairs of the Arab nations and supporting the Israeli
aggressors,” the statement said. It said, “punitive operations against the Israeli
marauders terrorizing the Palestinian and Lebanese peoples will continue not only in
the occupied Arab lands but they will spread all oven the world.
“The bomb attacks, the kidnappings and the assassinations of terrorists from over
the ocean (overseas) will continue,” it said. “The terrorist Reagan must know that
other American embassies and warships will be blown out like the American Embassy and
the marine headquarters in Beirut. The partial withdrawal of American personnel from
Beirut won’t mislead us on save them.”
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