Bulgarian authorities believe a Canadian man accused of being a Hezbollah operative responsible for a deadly bomb attack may be hiding in the Gaza Strip.
Hassan El Hajj Hassan, 25, who emigrated from Lebanon to Canada as a child, was named Thursday as one of two surviving suspects responsible for last year’s bombing of a bus at an airport in Burgas, on Bulgaria’s coast, that killed five Israeli tourists and their local driver.
HandoutHassan El Hajj Hassan seen in an undated photo, released by Bulgarian authorities.
Mr. Hassan is wanted alongside Meliad Farah, 32, an Australian citizen. The Lebanese Shi’ite group Hezbollah allegedly recruited the two while they were studying engineering at the Lebanese International University.
The role of people linked to the school has come to the forefront in the case: Lebanese officials confirmed to investigators that a printer at the school’s Beirut campus was used to make the false identity papers used by the bombing suspects, Bulgaria’s Presa reported.
Officials from the school could not be reached Friday.
Bulgarian authorities have made a worldwide appeal for assistance. Investigators have been told the fugitives have not returned to Lebanon and are suspected of staying in Gaza, controlled by the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas.
Canadian government officials said they were offering full co-operation in the probe, although the RCMP declined to comment on any involvement it might have.
Mr. Hassan is alleged to have returned to Canada to collect money sent through international wire transfers. He has a child who remains in Canada and he came back to visit his child before the deadly July 18, 2012, bombing, the National Post has learned.
AP Photo/ Impact Press Group, FileA damaged bus is transported out of Burgas airport, Bulgaria, a day after a deadly suicide attack on a bus full of Israeli vacationers.
Authorities allege the men collected about $100,000 wired to bank accounts in Canada and Australia.
Prior to the bombing, the men flew from Beirut to Warsaw, Poland, and then travelled by train to Bulgaria, Presa reported.
Mr. Hassan arrived using his own Canadian passport, then used a false Michigan driver’s licence that named him as Ralph William Rico from Grand Rapids.
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They posed as tourists traveling to Romania and Bulgaria and were seen in several parts of Bulgaria in the weeks before the attack.
Authorities suspect the plan was for the bus to be blown up en route to the tourists’ Black Sea hotel using a remote detonator, which had a 10 km range. Their plans were likely disrupted when the man planting the bomb, hidden in a backpack, was unnerved and his accomplices detonated it early.
HandoutImage of second suspect, Australian Meliad Farah.
DNA found on documents recovered after the explosion led investigators to believe the dead bomber was related to Mr. Hassan, although the exact connection is uncertain.
In addition to the six dead, 32 people were injured in the July 18, 2012, blast at Sarafovo Airport targeting Israeli tourists arriving from Tel Aviv to visit Bulgaria’s Black Sea resort.
Mr. Hassan was born in Lebanon and came as a child with his mother and brother to join his father, who had already moved to Canada and become a Canadian citizen.
Bulgaria’s former Interior Minister Tsvetan Tsvetanov previously said the bombing suspects were part of a Hezbollah support network.
“The Burgas bombers were maintaining part of Hezbollah’s structures in Canada and Australia and had contacts with other representatives of this organization,” Mr. Tsvetanov said in February.
He also said both Canada and Australia provided information confirming Hezbollah funded the bombing.
Hezbollah has previously denied responsibility for the bombing.
National Post
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