U.S. Indicts Iraqi Dutch in Fallouja Attack Plot

A Dutch citizen was indicted by a U.S. grand jury on charges of conspiring to kill Americans in Iraq, the Justice Department said Friday.

Iraqi-born Wasem Delaema, 32, is accused of plotting attacks against U.S. troops near Fallouja in October 2003. He is the first person charged in this country with terrorist activities in Iraq.

Delaema was arrested in May during a raid on his home in the Dutch city of Amersfoort. A Dutch court will decide whether to extradite Delaema to the United States based on the six-count indictment handed up by a grand jury in Washington.

He faces life in prison if convicted. Delaema’s Dutch attorney, Victor Koppe, has denied that his client was involved in any attacks.

Meanwhile, Baghdad’s airport was shut down Friday because of a pay dispute between the Iraqi government and a British firm contracted to provide security.

The firm, Global Securities Group, complained that it had not been paid for months.

As negotiations continued, the Interior Ministry sent troops to reopen the facility but called them back after they were confronted by U.S. forces at a checkpoint on the airport highway.

The Transportation Ministry said the airport reopened today under an agreement with the company. It gave no details.

Despite the closure, former hostage Roy Hallums left Iraq for the United States on Friday, two days after he was rescuedfrom an isolated farmhouse near Baghdad, the military said.

A statement said he left aboard a C-17 transport plane that took off from a U.S. Air Force base at Balad, 50 miles north of Baghdad.

Hallums, 57, formerly of Newport Beach, Calif., was working for the Saudi Arabian Trading & Construction Co. supplying food to the Iraqi army when he was kidnapped Nov. 1.