A man accused of working as Osama bin Laden’s bodyguard has been living in Germany and receiving more than $1,400 a month in welfare payments, according to a new government report.
According to the Evening Standard, the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia has been paying Sami A. and his family 1,168 euros, or $1,430, a month for welfare, despite previously being considered a “danger for public safety” by a German court.
Sami A., whose full name cannot be revealed due to German privacy laws, has been under observation since 2006 and is suspected to still be involved in Islamic terror circles.
He found himself in Germany more than two decades ago on a student visa and allegedly trained at one of bin Laden’s terrorist camps in 2000. According to the Washington Post, his involvement with al Qaeda and bin Laden was revealed in a 2005 trial in Dusseldorf, Germany.
Sami A. denied being involved with the terrorist organization, but the court still found him “an acute and considerable danger for public security” and therefore denied his asylum request. However, he wasn’t deported back to Tunisia out of fears that he would be tortured there.
News of his welfare payments was revealed by the staunchly anti-immigration party, the Alternative for Germany party, which addressed it in a regional parliament session.
The group released a statement opposing his stay in Germany, writing: “What fate awaits Sami A. in Tunisia is not the problem of German taxpayers.”
