'Jet terror plotter' admits planning small Heathrow explosions as a stunt

A man accused of masterminding a suicide plot to blow up airliners today admitted planning to carry out explosions at Heathrow.

Abdullah Ahmed Ali said he and his group had planned to create small explosions at the London airport as a political 'stunt'.

They had wanted to target Parliament but scrapped this idea because of high security there.

Ali told Woolwich Crown Court he had planned to make small devices using hydrogen peroxide and batteries disguised in soft drinks bottles.

But tests in a park near his home did not work and it was decided that co-defendant Assad Sarwar would get instructions from a Kashmiri freedom fighter in Pakistan on how to make the explosive HMTD.

Asked why the devices were to be disguised in Lucozade and Oasis bottles, Ali said: 'We found out the Houses of Parliament had really high security, armed guards and all sorts.
'I started thinking how I could take this into the Houses of Parliament and this is what I came up with.'

But by the time of their arrest the target had changed to the airport.

Ali, 27, said: 'Having done more research we thought it would be too difficult at the Houses of Parliament, security would be too tight.

'There were so many armed guards about, we wouldn't be able to get out of it and because of what happened to the guy in the Stockwell thing, Jean Menezes.

'Around late July we considered a new idea. We thought it would be an airport terminal. An airport is an obvious target - it was more sensational, we would get a lot more attention.'

He denied there was ever a plan to set off devices on aircraft.

Ali told the court he recruited friends to make so-called martyrdom videos. He approached co-defendants Ibrahim Savant and Umar Islam because they were white and black respectively and would appeal to a wider audience.

Defence barrister Nadine Radford QC asked why he appeared to be angry on one video and used the term kuffar, meaning non-believer.

Ali replied: 'The whole idea was to be sensational and threatening and angry. We were just copying the rhetoric and statements and style of other videos. Kuffar is not a derogatory term, it's just a general word to mean unbeliever. It's directed at the Government.'

Eight British Muslims are accused of plotting to launch co-ordinated suicide attacks on passenger jets flying from Heathrow to the US and Canada.

They are: Ali, Sarwar, Savant, Tanvir Hussain, and Arafat Waheedall, all 27; Islam, 30; Waheed Zaman, 24; and Mohammed Gulzar, 26.

They were all arrested on 9 August 2006 following a surveillance operation inside an alleged bomb factory in Forest Road, Walthamstow.

The trial continues.