Yoon not involved in Algerian attack: brother

OTTAWA – The brother of a young man from London, Ont. is denying reports that he was mixed up with the al-Qaeda linked militants who waged a deadly attack on an Algerian gas plant in January.

Two high school friends from London, Xristos Katsiroubas and Ali Medlej, both in their early 20s, have been identified among the dead as attackers.

Speculation is swirling that the two young men may have been joined by two others, including 24-year-old Aaron Yoon.

But Yoon’s brother, who wanted to remain anonymous, said the reports, including one that he is in prison, are unfounded.

“I don’t know why they’d even mention that in the same broadcast, in the same sentence,” Yoon’s brother told Global News in an interview from London, Ont. “He wasn’t involved. Our family, our hearts go out to Ali and Xris’ family. It must be hard for them.”

Yoon is in Mauritania, the country that harboured the organization involved in the Algerian attack, where he is studying the Koran and Arabic and is free to travel, according to his brother.

“He’s not in trouble,” he said. “I believe him. I have no evidence otherwise.”

His brother said he spoke with Yoon on Sunday and has been speaking with him regularly since the police visited the family’s apartment three weeks ago to tell him Katsiroubas and Medlej were dead, and to ask about Aaron.

“He was totally shocked. He didn’t know that happened. He seemed genuine,” said Yoon’s brother.

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The threesome were high school friends, attending London South Secondary School together. They also converted to Islam around the same time. Yoon, a Korean-Canadian, was raised Catholic.

“It was a positive thing,” said his brother of Yoon’s conversion. “I obviously had questions, a few conversations about it and through his actions around the house, he was just a better person, much more respectful.”

Yoon was also against terrorism, according to his brother, who fears he is being assumed guilty by association.

“Referring to him as a homegrown radical is completely crazy to me. Aaron hasn’t been in contact with Ali and Xris for at least a year,” said Yoon’s brother.

Yoon’s friends died in January after a four-day standoff at an isolated Algerian gas plant left 38 hostages and 29 militants dead. The group that stormed the plant was allegedly led by Algerian Mokhtar Belmokhtar.

Yoon did meet Medlej and Katsiroubas in Morocco in 2010, but lost contact with them within a year. His brother said Yoon didn’t know what happened to them.

But his brother said Yoon was there to learn about his new faith, not to engage in terrorist attacks.

“It’s because they were friends in London and met overseas, and he was the last people that Xris and Ali spoke with,” said Yoon’s brother. “He wasn’t in the attack. Thank God, he wasn’t in the attack.”

Yoon said his brother told him that he plans on returning to Canada next January.

When asked whether it was investigating any others as part of the attack, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police would only say the investigation continues and no further information will be given at this time.

Neither Public Safety Minister Vic Toews nor the Canadian Security Intelligence Service were commenting on Wednesday.

Officials at the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade would only say, “We are aware of a Canadian who has been detained abroad.”

But the NDP foreign affairs critic Paul Dewar said the fact that at least two Canadians were involved in the attack raises questions about whether CSIS should have done more.

“We know that CSIS was following at least two of them if not more. The question is what did they do with that information,” he said. “If we are just following people and not really doing anything, we know what the result is.”