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De Menezes: 'Could've been me'
30/08/2005 07:55 - (SA)
London - A friend of one of the London bombing suspects said he could have been shot by police instead of Brazilian Jean Charles de Menezes, a newspaper revealed on Tuesday.
Somali-born Abdi Omar was one of two men police were looking for when they began tailing De Menezes from his south London flat, The Guardian said.
Bus driver Omar rents the flat above the apartment where De Menezes lived, the newspaper said.
"It could have been me who got shot that day," Omar told The Guardian.
"I don't know what to make of all this. I don't know what to do."
On July 7, 56 people were killed in London, including four apparent suicide bombers in three blasts on the subway and one on a bus.
Detonate
The July 21 copycat attack failed when the bombs did not detonate fully and 27-year-old electrician De Menezes was shot dead the following day.
He was followed into Stockwell subway station and shot on board a train by anti-terrorist officers who mistakenly thought he was a suicide bomber.
Omar is a friend of one of the four July 21 suspect bombers, Hamdi Issac, also known as Osman Hussein, who is fighting extradition after being arrested in Rome.
Ethiopian-born Issac, 27, is accused of trying to blow up an Underground train at Shepherd's Bush station in west London.
Police had been watching the block where Omar lived because they had found his gym membership card in the rucksack containing the Shepherd's Bush bomb, The Guardian said.
Omar, 42, says he lent his gym card to his friend Issac.
Gym
"I knew him from the gym, although not well, not 100 percent," he told the newspaper.
"I lent him my card. But I have no idea why it was in the rucksack."
According to other members of Omar's family, police raided the home of his estranged wife a few hours after De Menezes had been shot.
After questioning her, police realised Omar had left Britain five days before the failed bombings, after telling relatives he was off for a trip to Somalia.
He denies visiting Somalia but says he was overseas on July 21.
"I knew nothing about what was happening until I came back," Omar said.
Returned
He added he saw the police when he returned to Britain two weeks ago.
Omar said: "They questioned me like they weren't interested. They asked me: 'Why do you think we are suspecting you?' I said: 'I don't know'.
"By this time they knew all about the gym card, and they told my lawyer later that they were not interested in me.
"They have damaged my life and my family. But if they ask me, I would help them."
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