Posted on 03/01/2005 4:54:10 AM PST by Coop
Terror suspect Saajid Badat has become the first al-Qaeda suspect to be convicted in Britain.
Badat had trained as a suicide bomber in Afghanistan and Pakistan and had conspired with Richard Reid, the British man who became known as the shoe-bomber, to blow up an aircraft.
Badat had been preparing to attack – he had booked a flight to the United States, via Amsterdam. At the Old Bailey today he admitted that he had conspired to put an explosive device on a plane in the months after September 11 2001.
The 25-year-old said he had been given the training and the bomb in Afghanistan. The conviction comes the government tries to get its controversial anti-terrorist laws through parliament without compromise.
Badat was arrested at his home in Gloucester in November 2003...
Police said that components of shoe bombs were found in Badat's home at the time of his British arrest and that “those components were found to be substantially similar to those in Reid’s shoe bombs".
In fact the two devices were identical - even the detonating cord on both had been cut from the same roll.
But Badat changed his mind and dismantled his own shoe bomb, which was designed to evade airport security, Richard Horwell, prosecuting, told the Old Bailey...
(Excerpt) Read more at channel4.com ...
Ping
Thank God for the Intelligence services. This was a very close call.
No assumption - that's what the article says.
The world has only a small supply of suicide bombers. If they were all living together, they'd make for a very tiny town.
As in, everybody would know each other because the town was so small. So it isn't surprising that there aren't very many suppliers of equipment for that community.
Oh, I wasn't surprised. :-) Just hadn't seen that fact in public. Although there are a lot of freaks and independent whackos out there, when you start examining focused, resourced terrorist acts the community does become much smaller. (But still way too big for my comfort zone!)
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.