Two plead guilty in plane bomb case

12 April 2012

Two British Muslims accused of plotting to blow up an airliner have pleaded guilty to conspiring to commit public nuisance.

Arafat Waheed Khan, 27, and Waheed Zaman, 24, admitted conspiring to commit public nuisance by distributing al Qaida-style videos threatening suicide bomb attacks in Britain.

The pair's pleas come exactly a week after five of their six co-defendants admitted the same charge.

They were Abdulla Ahmed Ali, 27, Assad Sarwar, 28, Tanvir Hussain, 27, Ibrahim Savant, 27 and Umar Islam, 30.

Ali, Sarwar and Hussain also pleaded guilty at Woolwich Crown Court, in south-east London, on July 14 to conspiracy to cause explosions.

The guilty pleas came as defence barristers summed up their individual cases as the three-month terror trial draws to a close. The jury are expected to retire early this week.

They must still decide if the eight men, also including Mohammed Gulzar, 26, are guilty of an unprecedented transatlantic airline suicide bomb conspiracy.

The men all now face two revised charges of conspiracy to murder, with one charge specifying that the attacks would involve the detonation of improvised bombs on passenger aircraft.

Prosecutors claim the gang plotted to kill thousands by smuggling home-made liquid bombs on board passenger jets flying from Heathrow to major cities in North America.

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