3 British men go on trial over alleged terror plot in UK

London, October 22: Three al-Qaeda-inspired British Muslim men, including two who received terror training in Pakistan, went on trial today for planning to target crowded areas and cause "mass death" which the prosecutors said would have been deadlier than the 2005 London bombings.

The three alleged terror plotters went on trial at the Woolwich Crown Court for a number of charges including planning a bombing campaign, recruiting others for terrorism and terrorism fundraising.

The details of the plot emerged as the trial of three central plotters, Irfan Naseer, 31, Irfan Khalid, 27, and Ashik Ali, 27, began.

All of them were from Birmingham and were unemployed.

"Two of the alleged ringleaders had received terror training in Pakistan and made martyrdom videos to be released after they had blown themselves up", the court was told by prosecutor Brian Altman.

They were taught in bomb-making, how to use weapons and poisons before returning to the UK to recruit others for their plot.

That included arranging for others to be sent to Pakistan for training as well, Altman said.

They planned to detonate homemade bombs in up to eight rucksacks and may also have planned to blow others with bombs on timers, he said.

A total of 11 men and one woman were arrested by police on various terrorism charges September last year, the Telegraph reported.

The three men denied the terror charges on them. Altman, prosecuting, told the court, "In September 2011, and after, officers of the West Midlands Counter-Terrorism Unit arrested a number of young men from the Birmingham area, who are resident in this country."

"With it the police successfully disrupted a plan to commit an act or acts of terrorism on a scale potentially greater than the London bombings in July 2005, if it had been allowed to run its course," he said.

"Although the finer details had not been worked out and agreed upon, the defendants were proposing to detonate up to eight rucksack bombs in a suicide attack and/or detonate bombs on timers in crowded areas in order to cause mass deaths and casualties. As you will hear, one of them was even to describe their plan as 'another 9/11'," Altman said.

"The defendants are jihadists, extremists, influenced, in particular, but not exclusively, by the lectures and writings of Anwar Al-Awlaki, a US-born extremist of Yemeni descent, and an affiliate of al-Qaeda on the Arabian Peninsula," he added.

Awlaki was killed by a drone attack just 12 days after the three men were arrested.

"Each of the defendants made the deliberate decision to become a terrorist, following, what they believed to be, the right path dictated by their extreme religious and ideological beliefs," Altman said.