A judge sentenced a top al-Qaeda operative to life in prison yesterday in a trans-Atlantic plot to bomb the New York Stock Exchange, the World Bank and landmark London hotels.
Judge Neil Butterfield called Dhiren Barot's plot to "slaughter hundreds -- if not thousands -- of wholly innocent men, women and children" sophisticated, deadly and active.
Seven others linked to Barot are to be tried in Britain next year.
"You have chosen to use your life to bring death and destruction to the Western world," Butterfield told Barot, who stared blankly as he heard the sentence. "You were planning to bring indiscriminate carnage, bloodshed and butchery ... on an unprecedented scale."
Barot, 34, planned a series of synchronized strikes in Britain -- including a plan to blow up a subway car as it passed through a tunnel below the River Thames -- as part of a plot to unleash a "memorable black day" of terror, prosecutors said.
Prosecutors said British attacks were "imminent." They said Barot put the US plot on hold after the Sept. 11 terror attacks.
"The conspiracy was in its final stages," prosecutor Edmund Lawson said.
In a detailed proposal submitted to al-Qaeda financiers in Pakistan, Barot planned to use a six-man group to blow up limousines crammed with gas cylinders underneath parking garages -- a plan that Barot said would kill "hundreds if the building collapses."
Lawson said Barot also wrote in documents that he wanted to add napalm and nails to the limousine bombs to "heighten the terror and chaos." He also considered adding radioactive material, Lawson said, but decided a dirty bomb should be used in a separate attack.
The former airline ticket clerk and Muslim convert pleaded guilty last month to conspiring to commit mass murder on both sides of the Atlantic. He is wanted in the US and Yemen on separate terror-related charges.
After sentencing, he will be temporarily transferred from his cell to the US to face a four-count indictment, including a charge of conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction, a spokesman for the Home Office said.
Starting in 1995, Barot trained at terrorist camps in Pakistan, Kashmir, Malaysia and the Philippines -- crisscrossing the globe to refine skills with weapons, bomb-making and chemicals, Lawson said.
He became quickly inspired to plot a "memorable black day for the enemies of Islam," Lawson said, quoting from Barot's notebook.
Under the alias Issa al-Britani, Barot was named by the US commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks as an associate of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged Sept. 11 planner.
‘CROSSING THE LINE’: China’s embassy in Seoul criticized US Forces Korea Commander General Xavier Brunson, asking if his ‘hostile’ remarks were authorized by Washington South Korea and the US are in talks over recent public remarks by the commander of US Forces Korea, Seoul’s presidential office said yesterday, after the comments drew sharp criticism from China. In a recent podcast interview, US Forces Korea Commander General Xavier Brunson described South Korea as “the dagger in the heart of Asia” from China’s east coast, prompting the Chinese embassy in Seoul to say that he had “truly crossed the line.” The interview came amid growing speculation that Washington might seek to expand the role of US Forces Korea in countering the growing regional influence of China, a key
SEEKING ORDER: Rodrigo Paz said that ‘anyone who wants to destroy the nation will have to deal with this president and the full force of the constitution’ Bolivian President Rodrigo Paz on Wednesday said that the nation was at a “breaking point” after nearly a month of protests that have caused shortages of food, fuel and medicine. Paz, who took office six months ago amid the worst economic crisis there in four decades, is battling a groundswell of fury over his policies. The political capital, La Paz, has been besieged by low-income workers and members of the indigenous majority calling for his resignation. “The country needs order and is reaching breaking point,” the 58-year-old said at a public event in La Paz, renewing his appeal for dialogue. On Tuesday, the Bolivian
Australian researchers have trained lab-grown brain cells on a silicon computer chip to play the 1990s shooter game Doom and said they are just scratching the surface of what the neurons could be capable of doing. It is the science-fiction work of biotech boffins at Cortical Labs, who researched and developed the technology that harnesses the workings of the brain’s networking system. Each so-called “biological computer” contains about 200,000 living human brain cells, grown from stem cells that were harvested from blood donations. Having mastered the simple computer game Pong, where a paddle is moved up and down to send a ball
Through the noise of rushing papers and whirring belts at a print factory in Kyoto, two creators watch their photo essay come to life in broadsheet form — part of an effort to win new audiences in the age of artificial intelligence (AI). Despite the decline of the publishing industry, self-publication and handmade “zine” magazines are growing in popularity in Japan, reflecting the nation’s enduring love of paper in the digital era. While speaking to Agence France-Presse at the plant, his hands black with ink, one of the creators, Kazuma Obara, said: “I think [paper] is a medium that engages all five
RSS