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Bomber blamed Britain for Iraq suffering
Justin Davenport, Crime Correspondent16.12.08
Born in Aylesbury, Abdulla spent his first five years in Britain before moving to Baghdad with his family.
After completing his studies at Baghdad College he followed his father, Professor Talal Abdulla, into medicine. In 1999 he travelled to Britain to study medicine but could not afford the fees and left after a year in Cambridge. He even claimed to have tried to join the British Army in an attempt to stay.
He graduated in medicine from the University of Baghdad in 2004 as the country slid into anarchy and civil war after Saddam Hussain was ousted in 2003. Abdulla blamed the British and Americans and became obsessed with avenging the deaths of friends at the hands of Shia Muslims.
In 2004 he returned to Cambridge to continue his medical training. His mother's aunt and her children lived in the city.
Friends said he was not afraid to share his extreme views on religion and politics and was linked to the radical Islamic group Hizb ut-Tahrir.
Abdulla is said to have met Kafeel Ahmed at religious groups in Cambridge.
At the time of the attempted bombings he worked as a locum house officer at the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Paisley, near Glasgow airport.
He is one of 1,985 doctors working in Britain who obtained their initial medical qualification in Iraq.
Kafeel Ahmed
The engineer in the terror cell, he modelled the car bombs on those used by insurgent forces in Iraq.
Born in Bangalore in India, his parents are both doctors. He first arrived in the UK as a student in 2001 and obtained a Masters degree in aeronautical engineering at Queen's University, Belfast, where he was president of the Islamic Society.
In May 2004 he began work on a PhD at the Faculty of Science and Technology at the Anglia Ruskin University in Cambridge, which he never completed.
Ahmed is believed to have become radicalised while mixing with members of Hizb ut-Tahrir in Cambridge. He was also a member of the Tablighi Jamaat - a missionary Islamic group behind plans to build a "mega mosque" in east London.
Ahmed left Cambridge in 2005 for India, returning only briefly the following year to do further work on his PhD. In May 2007 he again returned to England telling his family: "I am involved in a large-scale, confidential project. It is about global warming."
He died on 2 August, five weeks after the Glasgow bombing.
Reader views (6)
The number of medical people involved in revolutions and terrorism seems a matter of concern - both Che Guevara and Fidel Castro were doctors.
- Tony Whitmarsh, Melbourne, Australia
@ Frank: The ponit is not who killed more civilians, Al-Qaida or the Americans and her coalition, rather the ponit is that since America and her coalition have attacked Iraq on a false pretext, they then attracted Al-Qaida to Iraq, the insurgency and the clashes between Shia and Sunni. None of these things were their before America arrived. Hence America and her coalition are to blame for this. Basically America opened Pandoras box.
- Abdul Basir, London
He conveniently ignored the fact that the majority of Iraqi citizens who were killed in Iraq were killed by car bombs and similar attacks perpetrated by al-Qaida. The very people he styled himself after.
The irony is too funny.
- Frank, Home Counties, England
I agree with the first comment. Why should ordinary people have to suffer when politicians go around in bullet proof cars with body guards,the people who started this tragedy in foreign lands.Nearly a million civilians have perished in Iraq and Afghanastan. To quell this misguided anger lets get our troops back home and lets have a bit of peace for a change and leave these people to settle their own problems.There again I forgot about the oil factor.
- Leslie May, Gateshead England
These guys have made it abundantly clear that it is the war in Iraq that motivated them. If he like hizb ut-tahrir he would have joined them, but they dont believe in militant means. The Tablighi jamat are apolitical. It seems that this issue is being used to create opinion against the aforementioned group even thought there is nothing in link them to the crime.
More NEW labour spin
- Ron Whelan, Norbury
Despite having received further education these people really aren't too bright, are they?
If they indeed "blamed Britain for Iraq suffering" - although no such claim is made in the body of the above article - then they ought to have aimed at the politicians responsible, not ordinary citizens. Why, if they'd done that, we might have even helped them!
- Croyboy, Croydon
