A 36-year-old Dane called Morten Storm says he was the man who led the CIA to Anwar al Awlaki, the al Qaeda cleric killed in a U.S. drone strike in Yemen last year. And he says he did it with a computer thumb-drive that secretly contained a tracking device.
Among the evidence he's produced: recorded telephone conversations, passport stamps showing multiple trips to Yemen, correspondence with Awlaki, and a recording of a conversation with an unidentified American - who acknowledges his role in the pursuit of Awlaki.
The Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten has published details of his story over the past few days, after reviewing documents and tapes of the conversations Storm provided. The Danish Intelligence Service PET won't confirm or deny Storm's account; CNN has yet to reach American officials for comment.
Storm appears to have led a life of many parts -- committed jihadist, family man and outdoor sports enthusiast.
In fact, he helped run a UK-based enterprise called Storm Outdoors -- on which his instructor's profile speaks of his time "living with the Beduins in the Deserts in the North of Yemen."
There is firm evidence that Storm, a former biker and petty criminal, moved within jihadist circles after converting to Islam in the late 1990s -- becoming known as Murad Storm.
One video clearly shows him at a rally of militant Islamists in London in 2005, listening to a speech by the extremist preacher Omar Bakri Mohammed. According to Jyllands-Posten, Storm was by then on the radar of the PET because of his links with Islamist militants.
The following year, he says, he changed sides, becoming a double-agent run by the PET.
Meeting Awlaki
According to Storm's account, he first met Anwar al Awlaki at his father's house in 2006, while studying in the Yemeni capital, Sanaa. Storm was attending Al Iman University -- which was renowned for militancy and where Awlaki himself taught.
"We talked freely to each other," Storm told Jyllands-Posten.
That was before Awlaki was arrested and spent some 17 months in a Yemeni jail, accused in connection with an al Qaeda plot.
It was while Awlaki was in jail that Storm says he underwent a transformation.
At some point in the winter of 2006, Storm approached the PET and offered his services. He says he was introduced to British intelligence and the CIA, and was a given a handler by PET. Jyllands-Posten says it has confirmed the identity of that handler.
Storm told the newspaper that the CIA and PET "knew that Anwar saw me as his friend and confidant. They knew that I could reach him, and find out where he stayed."
When Awlaki was released from prison Storm was able "to bring materials and electronic equipment to him," using money provided by Danish intelligence.
Al Qaeda's shopping list
Storm says the CIA wanted to plant a tracking device in the equipment he was taking to Yemen, but it was becoming more difficult to reach Awlaki, who by 2009 was in hiding in remote Shabwa province.
Storm's last meeting with the militant cleric - by now perhaps al Qaeda's most influential propagandist - was in September 2009, he told Jyllans-Posten. Storm stayed at the house of an al Qaeda sympathizer.
At a desert hide-out, Awlaki asked Storm to acquire solar panels or a transportable fridge which could be used for cooling explosives components.
"We also discussed the terrorist attacks. He had some plans that would hit large shopping centers in the West or elsewhere with many people with poison attacks," according to Storm's account.
Storm's passport includes an exit stamp from Yemen dated September 19, 2009.
A few weeks after he returned to Copenhagen, Storm says he met CIA and PET officials.
He was shown satellite photographs of the area where he had met Awlaki and identified the house where he had stayed.
A short time later, Yemeni forces launched an assault on the house, killing its owner.
