‘Misha’ Speaks: An Interview with the Alleged Boston Bomber’s ‘Svengali’

[kwassa]

http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/nyrblog/2013/apr/28/tamerlan-tsarnaev-misha-speaks/

Today I was able to meet “Misha,” whose real name is Mikhail Allakhverdov. Having been referred by a family in Boston that was close to the Tsarnaevs, I found Allakverdov at his home in Rhode Island, in a lower middle class neighborhood, where he lives in modest, tidy apartment with his elderly parents. He confirmed he was a convert to Islam and that he had known Tamerlan Tsarnaev, but he flatly denied any part in the bombings. “I wasn’t his teacher. If I had been his teacher, I would have made sure he never did anything like this,” Allakhverdov said.

A thirty-nine-year-old man of Armenian-Ukrainian descent, Allakhverdov is of medium height and has a thin, reddish-blond beard. When I arrived he was wearing a green and white short-sleeve football jersey and pajama pants. Along with his parents, his American girlfriend was there, and we sat together in a tiny living room that abuts the family kitchen.

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I’ve been cooperating entirely with the FBI. I gave them my computer and my phone and everything I wanted to show I haven’t done anything. And they said they are about to return them to me. And the agents who talked told me they are about to close my case.

[Heather MC]

1. I was wondering how long it would take

to find out who the uncle was referring to. And now we know, the guy who lives in his mom's basement, so to speak.

I think the Uncle wanted someone else to blame, once he got over his anger. Their seems to be a lot of it's not his fault it's someone else's fault type reasoning in that family.

[burnsei sensei]

2. I don't believe in Svengalis.

The first cause, and most powerful cause of every terrorist act is personal responsibility, and the individual choice to do violence.
Period.
Good traditions and good doctrines don't necessarily produce good people.
Goodness is a choice, not a belief and not a thought.