The Al Farouq training camp, also called Jihad Wel al-Farouq,[1] was a Taliban and Al-Qaeda training camp near Kandahar, Afghanistan. Camp attendees received small-arms training, map-reading, orientation, explosives training, and other training. Nasir al-Bahri reported that the camp was only established following the arrival of Egyptian Islamic Jihad and Egyptian Islamic Group militants who had suitable expertise as to provide training to others.[2]
The United States attacked the area with cruise missiles on August 20, 1998, in retaliation for the 1998 embassy bombings.[3][4] It continued to operate until August 2001, when it was shut down by its trainers.[5] The camp was bombed again on October 10, 2001.[6]
According to U.S. intelligence analysts, the director of the Al Farouq camp was a Saudi named Abdul Quduz, who was later one of the commanders at the battle of Tora Bora.[7][8][9]
Abu Walid al Masri (b. 1945), one of the Afghan Arabs who fought as volunteers in the 1980s against the Soviet Union, had stayed in Afghanistan after the Soviet withdrawal. During the mid-1990s, at the age of about 50, he served as a senior trainer at the camp.[10] In this period, various ethnic factions in Afghanistan were competing for power, with the Taliban soon to emerge in control. Saif al-Adel stated that Asim al-Yamani was also a trainer at the camp.[11]
The Pentagon released photographs yesterday showing the obliteration of most of the buildings and training areas in Garmabak Ghar, which it identified as a terrorist training camp in southeastern Afghanistan near Kandahar, the Taliban stronghold. The camp, known as Farouk, had trained some of Mr. bin Laden's crucial associates, including Mohammed Saddiq Odeh and Mohamed Rashed Daoud Al-Owhali, who were convicted in New York this year of assisting in the bombing of the American Embassy in Nairobi, Kenya in 1998.
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The detainee relocated from the Jalalabad, Afghanistan safehouse to one of the rear echelon camps in the Tora Bora region. The detainee was shown to his position by Abdul Quduz.
When the detainee arrived in Tora Bora, Afghanistan, he was shown to his position. A Saudi Arabian who led the position issued the detainee a Kalashnikov and showed him where to go. There were between 10 and 12 Arabs in this position.
When the detainee arrived in Tora Bora, Afghanistan he was shown to his position. A Saudi Arabian, who led the position, issued the detainee a Kalashnikov and showed him where to go. There were between 10 and 12 Arabs in the detainee's position. A source stated that the Saudi Arabian individual in the previous statement was an al Farouq Camp Commander and a leader at Tora Bora, Afghanistan.