Briefly: Europe

ROME | An Algerian national and bomb-making expert has been deported from Italy to Algeria after he was sentenced to prison for belonging to an extremist cell linked to al Qaeda, the Interior Ministry said Sunday.

Border police put Khaled Serai, who nearly three years ago was sentenced to a six-year prison term by a Naples court for his links with a “terrorist” cell, on a flight from Rome to Algiers late Saturday.

Serai, who also was charged with encouraging illegal immigration, had his sentenced confirmed on appeal on Oct. 27.

The ministry said the Algerian was deported “for public order and security reasons.”

Serai was described as a bomb-making expert who had set up “a terrorist cell” with other Muslim extremists active in Salerno, Naples, Brescia and Vicenza with the aim of providing logistical support to members of al Qaeda’s branch in North Africa.

Cell members had planned to carry out attacks in Italy against Western targets, including by exploding large ships, “which could have caused the deaths of thousands of people,” the ministry said.

SWITZERLAND

Assange sought as guest at Davos forum

GENEVA | The head of the Davos economic forum said Sunday he would have liked WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to attend next month’s summit of world political and business elites in the Swiss ski resort.

“I should invite him,” Klaus Schwab, head of the World Economic Forum (WEF), told Sunday newspaper SonntagsZeitung. “But it is not possible, as he is not allowed to leave Britain.”

Mr. Assange spent Sunday, his third full day under “mansion arrest,” at a friend’s house in Britain while he fights extradition to Sweden to face questioning in connection of allegations of sexual assault against two women.

“I will wait until Swedish justice clears him,” Mr. Schwab said.

The 39-year-old Australian denies the charges against him and has vowed that his whistleblowing website will continue to publish secret U.S. diplomatic cables, thousands of which it has already released.