Syria has extradited to Egypt the man behind the shooting...

Syria has extradited to Egypt the man behind the shooting of 58 British and other foreign tourists at Luxor in 1997. Refaie Ahmed Taha, the head of the Egyptian terrorist group al-Gama'a al-Islamiya, faced the death penalty if convicted, the Islamic Observation Centre said in London.
The attack was reported to have been sponsored by Osama bin Laden and led to a crackdown by Egypt on militant Islamic groups. Taha is the most senior Islamic leader to be extradited to Egypt for several years.
According to the IOC he was arrested in Damascus several weeks ago after returning from Sudan.
Gama'a led a violent campaign from 1992 to 1997 to topple President Hosni the Mubarak government and set up an Islamic state. About 1,200 people were killed.
Taha opposed a 1997 truce call issued by jailed colleagues and endorsed by Gama'a leaders in exile a year later. Since the Luxor massacre, Gama'a has been observing the ceasefire.
Insiders say the ceasefire call was behind Taha's decision to step down as head of the group the following year.
Urs von Daeniken, Switzerland's federal police chief, travelled to Egypt and subsequently told a news conference that President Mubarak's government believed that militants staged the 1997 Luxor massacre upon orders from Mustafa Hamza, military commander of the Al-Gama'a Al-Islamiya, with funding from bin Laden.