Nizar ben Abdelaziz Trabelsi (born 2 July 1970) is a Tunisian former professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...

. In 2003, he was convicted as terrorist and sentenced to ten years' imprisonment for his association with

Al-Qaida Al-Qaeda (; , ) is an Islamic extremist organization composed of Salafist jihadists. Its members are mostly composed of Arabs, but also include other peoples. Al-Qaeda has mounted attacks on civilian and military targets in various countri ...

, and for plotting to attack US targets including American soldiers stationed at the Belgian airbase

Kleine Brogel Air Base Kleine Brogel Air Base is a Belgian Air Component military airfield located east of Kleine-Brogel, in the municipality Peer, Belgium. It is home to the Belgian 10th Tactical Wing, operating F-16 Fighting Falcons, which are capable, among other ...

Football career

Trabelsi played in Germany for

Fortuna Düsseldorf Düsseldorfer Turn- und Sportverein Fortuna 1895 e.V., commonly known as Fortuna Düsseldorf (), is a German football club in Düsseldorf, North Rhine-Westphalia, which competes in the 2. Bundesliga. Founded in 1895, Fortuna entered the league ...

Wuppertaler SV Wuppertaler SV is a German association football club located in Wuppertal, North Rhine-Westphalia. The city was founded in 1929 out of the union of a number of smaller towns including Elberfeld, Barmen, Vohwinkel, Cronenberg and Ronsdorf – e ...

, 1. FC Wülfrath, SV 09/35 Wermelskirchen and

VfR Neuss VfR is a German-language acronym that may appear in various contexts: *Verein für Raumschiffahrt, en:Society for Space Travel, a historical amateur rocket club in Germany * Verein für Rasensport (en:Association for Field Sports) or Verein für Ra ...

, as a

midfielder A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundarie ...

Association with Al-Qaida

Trabelsi had traveled to Afghanistan and met

Osama bin Laden Osama bin Mohammed bin Awad bin Laden (10 March 1957 – 2 May 2011) was a Saudi-born extremist militant who founded al-Qaeda and served as its leader from 1988 until Killing of Osama bin Laden, his death in 2011. Ideologically a Pan-Islamism ...

on several occasions. In 2001, Trabelsi was suspected of plotting to attack a US embassy in Paris, which was uncovered and stopped.BBC News (2007-12
''Belgium frees jailbreak suspects''
22 December 2007. He is said to be the designated suicide bomber, and was to wear a business suit to conceal the strapped bomb onto himself before walking into the embassy. Trabelsi was arrested in an apartment, in

Uccle Uccle () or Ukkel () is one of the 19 municipalities of the Brussels-Capital Region, Belgium. In common with all of Brussels' municipalities, it is legally bilingual (French–Dutch). It is generally considered an affluent area of the city a ...

near

Brussels Brussels (french: Bruxelles or ; nl, Brussel ), officially the Brussels-Capital Region (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) (french: link=no, Région de Bruxelles-Capitale; nl, link=no, Bruss ...

, Belgium on 13 September 2001. He was also implicated by Briton

Saajid Badat Saajid Muhammad Badat (born 28 March 1979) is a British terrorist who was sentenced to a 13-year prison term for planning to blow up an aircraft with a bomb hidden in his shoe. Badat did not go through with the plot. His co-conspirator Richard ...

, who alleged that both of them had conspired with

Richard Reid Richard Colvin Reid (born 12 August 1973), also known as the "Shoe Bomber", is the perpetrator of the failed shoe bombing attempt on a transatlantic flight in 2001. Born to a father who was a career criminal, Reid converted to Islam as a young ...

supposedly to blow up two US-bound airliners using shoe bombs simultaneously.

Conviction

In 2003, Trabelsi was sentenced to a ten-year prison term in Belgium. He was also found guilty of illegal weapons possession and being a member in a private militia. On 3 October 2013, he was extradited to the United States. In September 2014, the

European Court of Human Rights The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR or ECtHR), also known as the Strasbourg Court, is an international court of the Council of Europe which interprets the European Convention on Human Rights. The court hears applications alleging that a ...

found that his deportation was performed in violation of

Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights prohibits torture, and "inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment". An absolute right Article 3 is an absolute right. The right is unqualified and cannot be balanced against the rights and ...

and ordered Belgium to pay 60,000 euros in damages to Trabelsi. Trabelsi was extradited to the United States in October 2013, after he completed his sentence in Belgium. , he remained in jail, in Washington D.C., awaiting trial.

References

Tunisian al-Qaeda members Islamic terrorism in Belgium Tunisian people imprisoned abroad Prisoners and detainees of Belgium Tunisian footballers Fortuna Düsseldorf players Wuppertaler SV players Expatriate footballers in Germany Tunisian expatriate footballers Tunisian expatriate sportspeople in Germany Association football midfielders Tunisian expatriate sportspeople in Belgium 1970 births Living people {{tunisia-footy-bio-stub