Report Places Cabdriver on List of Trade Center Bomb Suspects

A U.S.-born cabdriver who lived in Iraq for several years has reportedly joined the list of those being sought in connection with the bombing of the World Trade Center. And a Muslim cleric, believed to be a link among suspects in the bombing, is facing a retrial in Egypt.

Law enforcement officials are looking for Musab Yasin as a suspect in the Feb. 26 bombing, New York Newsday reported. A 1992 New Jersey telephone listing shows an “M. Yasin” residing at the same building as Mohammed A. Salameh, a man indicted in the bombing, Newsday said.

“He hasn’t been charged with anything so I’m not going to comment,” said Joe Valiquette, spokesman for the New York FBI office.

Investigators have told Newsweek magazine that Salameh and another former cabdriver, Mahmud Abouhalima, who is also wanted for questioning, were seen together at a New York-area gas station the night before the blast.

But Robert Precht, Salameh’s lawyer, denied the story and accused the FBI of leaking false information in an effort to try the case in the press.

Abouhalima, 33, an Egyptian immigrant who has been described as a possible ringleader in the blast, has vanished. Salameh is being held without bail.

Salameh, 25, and Nidal Ayyad, 25, a chemical engineer, were indicted last week on charges of causing death and “maliciously” damaging the trade center. Ibrahim A. Elgabrowny, 42, was arrested after being named in a separate five-count indictment for obstructing justice and carrying false passports.

Elgabrowny, Salameh and Abouhalima are followers of Sheik Omar Abdul Rahman, a blind Egyptian fundamentalist cleric who has been living in the United States for nearly three years. Abdul Rahman says he had nothing to do with the bombing.