NICOSIA – A man being tried on allegations that he planned attacks on Israeli tourists in Cyprus has admitted being a member of the Lebanon-based militant group Hezbollah and staking out locations that such visitors frequent, his lawyer said Wednesday.
Hossam Taleb Yaacoub’s admissions follow accusations that Hezbollah was behind a bombing in Bulgaria that killed five Israeli tourists and a bus driver. Authorities in Cyprus have been reluctant to link the case to the attack in Bulgaria, but both have fed concerns about militant activity in Europe.
Lawyer Antonis Georgiades noted that Yaacoub, who is Swedish and Lebanese, told a Cyprus court that he came to Cyprus on business with no plan to harm anyone. But Yaacoub, 24, also admitted that an unidentified man in Lebanon, where Hezbollah is based, gave him the “mission” of recording flight arrivals and bus routes of Israeli tourists and checking out a hospital parking lot.
Georgiades said Yaacoub acted alone in Cyprus and that instructions were given to him “in complete secrecy” by a man whose face he couldn’t see.
Cyprus police arrested Yaacoub last July, several days before the bombing.
The European Union, of which Cyprus is a member, has not formally designated Hezbollah as a terrorist organization.
Prosecutors say Yaacoub conspired with others to “abduct a person for the purpose of subjecting him to harm or attacking him to cause grievous bodily harm” and was prepared to carry out missions around the world against Israeli citizens.