Airline Bombers Admit to Bomb Plot

Three of the five bombers, who conspired to blow up airliners over the Atlantic with 'soft drink bombs', have admitted to conspiring to cause explosions. But they deny any murder conspiracy. If you blow up an airplane in mid-flight I think you're going to kill some people. BBC

Three men accused of plotting to blow up transatlantic planes have admitted conspiring to cause explosions.

Abdulla Ahmed Ali, Assad Sarwar and Tanvir Hussain also admitted conspiring to cause a public nuisance by making videos threatening bombings.

Two other defendants, Ibrahim Savant and Umar Islam, also pleaded guilty to the public nuisance charges.

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he men deny two charges, which have been amended, of conspiracy to murder between 1 January and 11 August 2006.

One specifies the attacks would have involved the detonation of improvised bombs on passenger aircraft.

'Immortality aim'

Prosecutors allege they planned to explode home-made bombs disguised as soft drinks on passenger jets flying from Heathrow to North American cities.

The men's arrests in August 2006 led to tight restrictions on carrying liquids on board aircraft.

Peter Wright QC, summing up the prosecution case on Monday, told the court the eight men had wanted to "achieve immortality and notoriety in equal measure".

Each of the defendants wanted to "murder as many civilian passengers as possible upon as many civilian aircraft as possible", he said.