February
26, 2008 British Court
Convicts Terror Trainer
'Osama Bin London'
London
An ethnic Indian extremist who called himself "Osama Bin London" was
Tuesday found guilty of training men in secret camps held in
secluded forested areas of Britain to fight abroad.
Tanzania-born street preacher Mohammed Hamid, said to be one of the
most important recruiters for Islamist extremism in Britain, was
convicted at the end of a major trial lasting five months.
The 50-year-old man, who held camps in Lake District and New Forest
regions of England, is thought to have trained the four men who
participated in the failed suicide bombing July 21, 2005.
The conviction marks a major success for counter-terrorism, as
Hamid's trial at the Woolwich crown court was the first to deal with
a new offence of attending terrorist training.
The jury heard no evidence of weapons or explosives, but relied on
surveillance tapes and recordings made by an undercover police
officer who had penetrated a London-based jihadist cell.
The conversations and films showed Hamid and his followers -
Muhammad al-Figari, Kader Ahmed and Kibley Da Costa - performing
what was described as "military training" over a two-year period.
Hamid's training came in the form of camping trips around Britain
and late night talks in the living room of his home in Hackney, east
London.
The training included leopard crawling low on the ground,
anti-ambush drills, forward rolls, casualty evacuation and firing
sticks held as imaginary rifles.
Three of his followers were found guilty of attending terrorism
training while the fourth, Atilla Ahmet, had pleaded guilty at the
beginning of the trial of soliciting to murder.
The three men had already been convicted but the trial was under a
reporting restriction.
Another man, Mousa Brown, was acquitted of receiving training.
Hamid denied radicalising young men and claimed he was not running a
"drop-in club" for the Al Qaeda terror network. He said he was
trying to offer young Muslims support because they were vulnerable
in the wake of the 9/11 attacks on the United States.
But Acting Assistant Police Commissioner Peter Clarke of the
Metropolitan Police said the men were responsible for the attacks in
London on July 21, 2005, and had celebrated the deaths that occurred
on when suicide bombers struck London on July 7, 2005.
"And in fact what they were doing accelerated and intensified to try
to mount attacks both here and overseas. You can only possibly
conclude that these were serious determined terrorists," Clarke
added.
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