A Syrian-born German linked to the 11 September 2001 U.S. attack has reportedly been arrested by Kurdish fighters and is being held in northern Syria.
According to AFP a commander of the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces alliance confirmed that Mohammed Haydar Zammar is in custody and being questioned.
Zammar was previously questioned by German police following the September 11 attacks, in which nearly 3,000 people were killed. He was later released and he left the country.
Hijackers deliberately crashed two planes into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York City on that fateful day. A third airliner hit the Pentagon near Washington D.C. Thanks to the brave and heroic efforts of the passengers and crew, a fourth hijacked plane never reached its intended target and crashed into a field in Pennsylvania.
The SDF has detained hundreds of foreign IS militants in efforts to drives the jihadist group from northern and eastern Syria.
The arrested militants are reportedly being held at camps near Raqqa, a city that served as the de facto capital of the IS “caliphate” until it fell to the SDF in October.
The US-led global coalition against IS said it could not confirm the report of Zammar’s arrest.
In December 2001, he was seized in Morocco and transferred to Syria, apparently as part of the US Central Intelligence Agency’s so-called “extraordinary rendition” programme.
In 2007, a Syrian court sentenced Zammar to 12 years in prison for four offences, including membership of the outlawed Syrian Muslim Brotherhood organisation.
Six years later in 2013 after Syria had descended into civil war, he was released as part of a prisoner exchange between the Syrian government and the hard-line Islamist rebel group, Ahrar al-Sham.
It is not clear what happened to Zammar afterwards, but in early 2014 he was pictured attending a meeting between IS militants and Syrian tribal leaders.
One unconfirmed report from late 2014 said he was sent to Egypt by IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi to persuade a jihadist group operating in the Sinai peninsula to swear allegiance to Baghdadi.
