Mystery:Yemeni man missing [Archives:2003/624/Local News]

The London-based Al-Sharq Al-Awsat (Middle East) daily indicated in its last Friday's issue that a Yemeni citizen has disappeared in the capital of Thailand, Bangkok.
The paper said that the family of Ameen al-Bukari, 37, lost contact with him since 31 December 2002 when he flew to Bangkok for business.
He stayed in a hotel called Naray in Thailand. However, the daily said that the hotel staff refused to provide any information about his stay.
The paper suggests that the reason behind his disappearance could be his alleged links to Arab Afghans as he did stay in Afghanistan and fought against US occupation.
Ameen al-Bukari was arrested in the past in Madagascar just before the September 11 attacks upon suspicion that he may belong to a terror network. But upon his acquittal, he returned to Yemen, according to his family.
Al-Bukari, 37, was brought up in al-Madeena al-Monawara and had fought against the Russians in Afghanistan where he became an active Arab Afghan in the early 1980s.
He survived a plot by the Russian soldiers in one of Afghanistan's main battles.
After his return to Saudi Arabia in 1990, he decided to return to his home country Yemen, where he stayed ever since.
During the 1990s, he abandoned extremist Islamist views and became a moderate Yemeni just as many other Arab Afghans did.
Al-Bukari used to work in import and export to and from countries such as Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, and African countries before he disappeared in Thailand.
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