The jury that will determine Zacarias Moussaoui's fate must decide whom it believes: Moussaoui himself, who, in stunning testimony, said he and shoe-bomber Richard Reid planned to fly a plane into the White House on Sept. 11, 2001; or the mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks, who said Moussaoui had nothing to do with the attacks on Washington and New York.
Moussaoui's testimony on Monday at his death-penalty trial that he was part of the Sept. 11 plot came as a shock, since he previously had denied any role in the attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people.
As soon as Moussaoui finished testifying, the jury was read statements made by Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the Sept. 11 mastermind now in US custody, who said Moussaoui was to have been used in a second wave of attacks completely disconnected from Sept. 11.
PHOTO: EPA
Moussaoui is the only person in the US charged in connection with the Sept. 11 attacks.
But even prosecutors are not alleging a direct role for Moussaoui in the Sept. 11 plot. Instead, they argue that Moussaoui allowed the Sept. 11 plot to go forward by lying about his al-Qaeda membership and his true plans when federal agents arrested him in August 2001.
He repeatedly had denied involvement in Sept. 11, and when he admitted guilt last April to conspiring with al-Qaeda to hijack aircraft and commit other crimes, he pointedly made a distinction between his conspiracy and Sept. 11.
On Monday, though, Moussaoui put himself at the center of the plot. He was asked by defense attorney Gerald Zerkin: "Before your arrest, were you scheduled to pilot a plane as part of the 9/11 operation?"
Moussaoui: "Yes. I was supposed to pilot a plane to hit the White House."
He said he knew few other details, except that planes were to be flown into the twin towers of the World Trade Center.
He had met Reid, his purported partner, in the 1990s at London's Finsbury Park mosque.
On Dec. 22, 2001, Reid was subdued by passengers on a flight from Paris to Miami when he attempted to detonate a bomb in his shoe. That plane landed safely in Boston. Reid later pleaded guilty and was sentenced to life in prison.
Moussaoui's defense attorneys, in their opening arguments, suggested that Moussaoui may prefer martyrdom to life in prison.
He is not cooperating with his court-appointed attorneys, and he testified against their wishes.
Mohammed's testimony came in the form of a 58-page statement culled from government interrogations. He said repeatedly that Moussaoui was to have been part of a second wave of attacks, distinct from US.
Mohammed said he was not aware that Moussaoui was in custody until after Sept. 11, and that Moussaoui's arrest on Aug. 16 would have disrupted Sept. 11 plans if he were a part of the operation. Mohammed said the second-wave of attacks never materialized because he did not anticipate the ferocity of the US response to Sept. 11 and the only other pilot backed out.
Four people jailed in the landmark Hong Kong national security trial of "47 democrats" accused of conspiracy to commit subversion were freed today after more than four years behind bars, the second group to be released in a month. Among those freed was long-time political and LGBTQ activist Jimmy Sham (岑子杰), who also led one of Hong Kong’s largest pro-democracy groups, the Civil Human Rights Front, which disbanded in 2021. "Let me spend some time with my family," Sham said after arriving at his home in the Kowloon district of Jordan. "I don’t know how to plan ahead because, to me, it feels
‘A THREAT’: Guyanese President Irfan Ali called on Venezuela to follow international court rulings over the region, whose border Guyana says was ratified back in 1899 Misael Zapara said he would vote in Venezuela’s first elections yesterday for the territory of Essequibo, despite living more than 100km away from the oil-rich Guyana-administered region. Both countries lay claim to Essequibo, which makes up two-thirds of Guyana’s territory and is home to 125,000 of its 800,000 citizens. Guyana has administered the region for decades. The centuries-old dispute has intensified since ExxonMobil discovered massive offshore oil deposits a decade ago, giving Guyana the largest crude oil reserves per capita in the world. Venezuela would elect a governor, eight National Assembly deputies and regional councilors in a newly created constituency for the 160,000
North Korea has detained another official over last week’s failed launch of a warship, which damaged the naval destroyer, state media reported yesterday. Pyongyang announced “a serious accident” at Wednesday last week’s launch ceremony, which crushed sections of the bottom of the new destroyer. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un called the mishap a “criminal act caused by absolute carelessness.” Ri Hyong-son, vice department director of the Munitions Industry Department of the Party Central Committee, was summoned and detained on Sunday, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported. He was “greatly responsible for the occurrence of the serious accident,” it said. Ri is the fourth person
At a calligraphy class in Hanoi, Hoang Thi Thanh Huyen slides her brush across the page to form the letters and tonal marks of Vietnam’s unique modern script, in part a legacy of French colonial rule. The history of romanized Vietnamese, or Quoc Ngu, links the arrival of the first Christian missionaries, colonization by the French and the rise to power of the Communist Party of Vietnam. It is now reflected in the country’s “bamboo diplomacy” approach of seeking strength through flexibility, or looking to stay on good terms with the world’s major powers. A month after Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) visited,