MANILA, Philippines — A Filipino doctor accused by U.S. authorities of plotting attacks in New York City, including Times Square, appeared in a Manila court Tuesday and told reporters that money he sent to a charity was misconstrued as funds intended to finance the disrupted plots.
Russell Salic smiled as he was led away in handcuffs by government agents after his brief appearance at the Manila court that is handling a U.S. extradition request, which he and his lawyer vowed to fight.
“That’s not true,” Salic said when asked by reporters about the allegations. “I just donated money without any malicious intent.”
He said U.S. authorities may have mistaken the money he sent to a charity as funding for the plots. An FBI agent who posed as a Muslim online was behind the allegations against him, he said.
A U.S. Department of Justice representative, Christopher Cardani, who attended the court hearing said the department would do everything to have Salic extradited to stand trial in America.
“This is an extremely serious matter in the United States,” Cardani told reporters. “It’s been alleged these three individuals conspired to build a bomb and explode it at Times Square in New York in the summer of 2016 and it doesn’t get any more serious than that.”
Last month, U.S. prosecutors said Salic was one of three Islamic State group sympathizers who plotted bombings and shootings last year at New York City concert venues, subway stations and Times Square before U.S. agents thwarted the plot.
Salic was taken into custody in Manila in April. Canadian citizen Abdulrahman El Bahnasawy was arrested in the United States last year and has pleaded guilty, and an American of Pakistani origin, Talha Haroon, was arrested in Pakistan in November.
Aside from the U.S. charges, Salic also faces separate criminal complaints alleging involvement in the abduction of six sawmill workers, two of whom were later beheaded, in the southern Philippine town of Butig in Lanao del Sur province in 2016.