Mercenary in Syria confesses to receiving funds and orders, for terrorist acts, from Saudi intelligence officer
Damascus – 6/12/2013 – Terrorist Maher Jihad Teklos confessed to committing crimes upon orders and instructions received from an officer in Saudi intelligence, including attacks on government establishments and abducting civilians for ransom money.
In confessions broadcast by the Syrian TV on Friday, Teklos said that he’s originally from al-Tal in Damascus Countryside, and that during the six years he worked at Saudi Arabia he came to know Brig. Gen. Mohammad al-Hwaish from the Saudi intelligence.
The terrorist said that al-Hwaish recruited him in exchange for 3,500 Saudi Riyals per month and instructed him to meet the head of the “military council” in al-Tal Ahmad Shamo, and he did as instructed.
Teklos said Shamo referred him to another man who trained him in using firearms, and when a group of terrorists decided to attack the Political Security department in al-Tal, Teklos was instructed to set up a barricade to prevent reinforcements from arriving at the site of the terrorist attack.
He said that al-Hwaish paid the terrorists 10 million Saudi Riyals for the aforementioned attack, sending the money in installments which Shamo would take and tell the others that he’s using them to buy weapons.
Teklos said that he and his cohorts abducted five people: Atef al-Lal. Omar Rajha, Ahmad al-Swadi, Omar al-Basha and Mohammad al-Arnous, then negotiated with their families for releasing them in exchange for ransom, with the families of three of the victims paying SYP 7 million each.
He said that after they retreated from al-Tal after the Syrian Army entered it and hid in a villa for two months near Talfita, and during this time Shamo and another terrorist brough three shipments of weapons from Lebanon, including AK-47 rifles, RPG rounds and mortar launchers.
After that, Teklos and his cohorts hid in a house in Deir al-Makran for two months, then they returned to al-Tal and started forming new armed groups, at which point Teklos was arrested.