Three Britons recruited as suicide bombers in an al-Qaeda-inspired plot to blow up transatlantic flights in mid-air using liquid explosives were jailed for at least 20 years today.
The plot's ringleaders hoped to evade airport security by smuggling homemade bombs onto US-bound flights using liquid explosives disguised as soft drinks. It triggered a global clampdown on passengers carrying liquids.
Police disrupted the plot in 2006 after the country's biggest covert surveillance operation.
Prosecutors said police had prevented an attack on the same scale as September 11th.
The would-be attackers filmed videos, intended to be released to the media after their deaths, threatening attacks against "the enemies of Islam".
Ibrahim Savant (29), Arafat Waheed Khan (29) and Waheed Zaman (26), all from London, had denied conspiracy to murder and said their videos were part of a documentary.
"Death and destruction will pass upon you like a tornado," Zaman said in one video played to the court. "As you kill us, you will be killed. And as you bomb us, you will be bombed."
Judge Timothy Holroyde said the men were "foot soldiers" unaware of their intended targets and took no part in planning the attacks or assembling the bombs. However, he said all three intended to kill "an uncertain but potentially large number of innocent men, women and children".
"In furtherance of that conspiracy, each of you recorded a suicide video in which you described yourself as being blessed by the opportunity to take part in that mission," the judge told Woolwich Crown Court.
The court heard how a team of suicide bombers planned to assemble and detonate the hydrogen peroxide devices in mid-air.
The plot's ringleader, Abdulla Ahmed Ali, identified seven flights to San Francisco, Toronto, Montreal, Washington, New York and Chicago that left London within less than three hours of each other. Ali was jailed for life last September.
Twelve people have been convicted in connection with the plot in a series of trials.
The latest three to be sentenced had faced two previous trials in 2008 and 2009. A jury at their first trial failed to agree a verdict. They were acquitted at the second trial of knowing that the plot was targeting planes.
Prosecutors took the unusual step of seeking a third trial where the men faced a wider charge of conspiracy to murder, replacing the previous charge of plotting to kill people on airliners.
Detectives took nearly 10,000 statements, searched 800 computers or memory sticks and visited countries including Pakistan, the United States, South Africa and Japan.
Reuters