Jury begins British "bomb plot" deliberations
Source: Reuters
By Michael Holden LONDON, March 16 (Reuters) - A London jury trying the case of seven Britons accused of plotting bomb attacks on targets ranging from nightclubs to gas suppliers and a shopping centre retired to consider its verdict on Friday. The year-long trial at London's Old Bailey criminal court has heard that the gang, some said to have links to al Qaeda, planned to use 600 kg (1,300 lb) of ammonium nitrate fertiliser to make explosives for use in the bombings. Prosecutors said the men had only to decide on a target when they were arrested in 2004 before carrying out what would have been the first homegrown attack by Islamist militants. Police swooped on the suspects about 16 months before four British Islamists carried out suicide bombings on London's transport system in July 2005, killing 52 commuters. Omar Khyam, his brother Shujah Mahmood, Waheed Mahmood, Anthony Garcia, Jawar Akbar, Salahuddin Amin and Nabeel Hussain deny conspiring with Canadian Mohammed Momin Khawaja to cause an explosion likely to endanger life. Garcia, Khyam and Hussain are also charged with possessing an article for terrorism -- the fertiliser. Khyam and his brother Mahmood are also accused of having aluminium powder -- an ingredient in explosives. They deny all charges. AMERICAN WITNESS The main prosecution witness in the case was Mohammed Babar, a Pakistan-born American who has admitted to terrorism-related offences in New York. He said he was the men's accomplice and had helped get materials for the detonators. Babar told the jury he had met some of those involved in the suspected conspiracy, dubbed the "British Bomb Plot" by U.S. officials, at training camps in Pakistan. Two of the suspects were part of a cell receiving explosives training and had taken orders from al Qaeda's third-in-command, a man identified as Abdul Hadi, Babar told the court. The prosecution said the men had discussed targets including London's biggest nightclub, the Ministry of Sound, gas, water and electricity supplies, synagogues, trains, and a large shopping centre, Bluewater in Kent, to the east of the capital. Babar said some of the suspects had also suggested poisoning fast food takeaways and beer at soccer matches. The prosecution said the fertiliser had been kept in a storage facility in west London. An undercover female police officer was placed as a receptionist to monitor the men's actions after staff became suspicious, and detectives discreetly swapped the fertiliser with an inert substance. Khyam, the plot's suspected ringleader, admitted in court to being "happy" when the Sept. 11 U.S. attacks took place and to training in Pakistan. However he said he was not involved in planning attacks in Britain and had wanted to "free Kashmir". Amin told British police when he returned from Pakistan that he was involved in a plot but told the court his confession resulted from being tortured by Pakistani security agents. The other defendants said they had no idea what the fertiliser was for, or stated they believed it would be only be used in the disputed Kashmir region between India and Pakistan.
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