Chaotic start to German al-Qa'ida bomb plot trial

The first trial in Europe of al-Qa'ida terrorist suspects got off to a chaotic start yesterday when one of the five defendants was barred from court for insulting the judge and shouting that God would defend him.

The trial of five Algerians accused of planning to let off a nail bomb at Strasbourg's Christmas market on New Year's Eve 2000 is expected to expose the reach of Osama bin Laden's network in Britain, Germany, Italy and Spain.

Four of the men are charged with plotting to detonate explosives with intent to kill. The plot was foiled when they were arrested in Frankfurt days before the planned attack.

Lamine Maroni, 31, Aeurobi Beandali, 23, Salim Boukhari, 30 and Fouhad Sabour, 37, are also charged, along with a fifth man, Samair Karimou, 33, of being members of a terrorist organisation.

The indictment accuses the men of using faked American Express and Visa credit cards duplicated from British accounts to purchase chemicals from various outlets across Germany for making the explosives ­ a technique they allegedly learnt in Afghanistan.

The opening of proceedings at Frankfurt's high court was interrupted when Mr Maroni insulted Judge Karlheinz Zeiher and shouted in English, "You want to kill me" and, "These people are Jews, they just want to take me for a ride". When he was warned to calm down and listen to his defence lawyer he yelled in Arabic: "I don't need a defence, my God is my defender."

Because of Mr Maroni's outbursts and with delays due to the massive security arrangements which sealed off part of Frankfurt around the court, no real evidence was heard.

Mr Beandali was thought to be ready to make a statement revealing that the attack was not planned for the Christmas market but a nearby synagogue. His lawyer, Achim Gröpper, told German journalists that his client was prepared to talk, but he did not get the chance.

Investigations by detectives suggest a well-motivated, financed and organised group with connections in place throughout the Continent long before 11 September last year.

Police raids on two Frankfurt flats rented by the group yielded part-prepared explosives and detonators. The suspects had also rented two flats in Baden-Baden, 40 miles from Strasbourg, for the days before and after the alleged attack.

A video was also found in their possession showing a trip they made in a rented car from Baden-Baden to Strasbourg and the Christmas market area around the city's cathedral.

All the accused are said to have trained in Afghanistan between 1998 and 2000, according to the Federal Public Prosecutor, Kay Nehm, who led the investigation. They formed the cell and planned the attack after arriving in Europe and contacting radicals in Britain and Italy, he claims.

Three of the men are said to have lived in Britain before moving to Germany and Mr Maroni's fingerprints are said to match those of a convicted robber in Britain. Further details of their British connections are likely to be revealed during the trial which is expected to last for at least a year.

The French authorities were also involved in the operation to arrest the men. German police moved in after information was passed across the border.

Mr Nehm also alleges that the group intended to feed weapons and explosives into the loosely knit Europe-wide network of radical Islamists, although there has not yet been any connection alleged between them and the Hamburg cell which included three of the 11 September suicide hijackers.

*A group allegedly linked to al-Qa'ida claimed responsibility yesterday for the gas truck blast at a synagogue on the Tunisian island of Djerba, which killed 16 people, including 10 Germans.

The claim was made in two London-based Arabic newspapers by a group calling itself the Islamic Army for the Liberation of the Holy Sites ­ the same group which said it was inspired by Osama bin Laden to carry out the 1998 bombings of the United States embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

The statement praises the truck driver, "the hero and martyr Nizar Ben Mohammed Nawwar Saif el Islam, the Tunisian", who allegedly left a note telling his family to remember him as a martyr.

There was no confirmation of the statement's veracity but the authorities in Tunisia said they were leaning towards the belief that the explosion on Thursday, which happened when a truck loaded with gas bottles crashed into the synagogue, was caused deliberately.

German police detained a man on Monday in connection with the explosion, but released him yesterday after questioning.