Posted on 11/21/2004 7:58:17 AM PST by knighthawk
PARIS: A French state prosecutor on Friday requested jail sentences of up to 10 years for 10 suspected radical Islamist accused in a failed al Qaeda plot to bomb a popular Christmas market in Strasbourg.
The prosecution alleges aides to Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden devised the plot in 1999 in Afghanistan.
Lawyers for three key suspects Mohamed Bensakria, Slimane Khalfaoui and Yacine Akhnouche have said their clients admitted having undergone military training in Afghanistan but denied plotting any attack.
Prosecutor Christophe Teissier asked a Paris court to hand Bensakria and Khalfaoui 10-year sentences, the maximum possible under the charge they face of association with criminals engaged in a terrorist enterprise.
He requested eight years in jail for Akhnouche and a 10-year sentence for another suspect, Rabah Kadri, who is in detention in London.
For the other six accused, Teissier sought jail terms ranging from two to seven years.
"It was a dangerous group because its goal was to kill," Teissier said of the accused, known collectively as the Frankfurt Group.
The attack was foiled when German police carried out a raid in Frankfurt on Dec. 25, 2000 after a tip-off from French intelligence. A German court for their part in the conspiracy later convicted four men.
Police discovered weapons, chemicals, detonators and a surveillance video showing exit points from the eastern city of Strasbourg, its cathedral and Christmas market.
According to the prosecution, the group planned to carry out their attack before Dec. 31, 2000. The aim was to cause a large number of victims by detonating a remote-controlled device.
A radical London-based imam, Abou Doha, arrested in February 2001, is considered one of the brains behind the plot and put up most members of the group before and after their stays in military training camps in Afghanistan.
He is not one of the 10 people, mostly Algerians, on trial in Pariss main criminal court over the foiled bomb attack in Strasbourg. The trial is due to run until December.
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