Bomb Plot Suspect 'praised' 9/11

[TriWooOx]

Quote:One of the alleged 21 July terror plotters thought the 9/11 attacks were a "good thing", a court has heard.

Yassin Omar believed Muslims were right to bomb the US because the West was against Islam, a jury was told.

His brother-in-law, known only as Mr A, told Woolwich Crown Court: "He confirmed that it's a good thing and it's a worthy cause."

Mr Omar, 26, and five other men, deny conspiracy to murder and cause explosions in London in 2005.

The other five are Hussein Osman, 28, Manfo Asiedu, 33, Muktar Ibrahim, 29, Ramzi Mohammed, 25, and Adel Yahya, 24.

The jury of nine women and three men was read extracts from a statement Mr A made to police.

In it, he said he and Mr Omar discussed their beliefs a few times, but never talked about terrorism.

Mr A, who was obscured from public view in court, said Mr Omar tried to justify the 11 September attacks to him - and he disagreed in strong terms.

He told the jury: "I said, 'Do not talk about that, there are people, a lot of people, who lost their loved ones. Why? Why did they deserve to die? Do not try and justify that crap to me'."

The witness said from then on Mr Omar was distant from him.

During cross-examination, Peter Carter QC, who is defending Mr Omar, said: "Yassin's views about 9/11 were he thought the West had behaved badly towards Muslims, but he thought 9/11 was a very bad thing."

But Mr A, who the court heard is a Muslim but drinks wine, replied: "No, that's incorrect."

The barrister went on: "Because he thought it was one of those acts that was going to put people off Islam and he wanted to draw people to Islam."

The witness said it did not come across that way.

Mr A told the court that when he realised one of the photos of the 21 July suspects resembled Mr Omar, he tried to find him.

He said he tracked down two of his brother-in-law's friends - one of whom was later identified as fellow defendant Manfo Kwaku Asiedu - who insisted Mr Omar would not have got involved in a terrorist plot.

Mr A later called the police and he told the court that if Mr Omar was guilty, he and his family wanted nothing more to do with him.

Muslim convert

Mr A told the jury that when he met Mr Asiedu while looking for Mr Omar he appeared to be nervous.

"What he kept saying was: 'Yassin was like a brother to me and he wouldn't get involved with anything like this'," the witness said.

The jury later heard that Mr Asiedu went to the police station on 26 July 2005 and was arrested.

During interviews he told officers he was a Muslim convert who came to the UK from Ghana in 1993 or 1994.

The court heard that he played for the Finchley mosque football team and was nicknamed George after footballer George Weah.

The six are accused of plotting to carry out a series of explosions on the London transport system on 21 July 2005 using home-made hydrogen peroxide bombs.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6359193.stm