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Train bombers 'planned other attacks'
 ISLAMIC extremists behind the train bombings in Madrid a year ago were planning other attacks before they blew themselves up as police raided their apartment, an investigating judge has told Spain's El Pais newspaper. A video found in the rubble warned of "new attacks and attacks against various targets: schools, a Jewish centre in Avila". Magistrate Olga Sanchez, who is heading the probe into the train blasts, said. "The suicide, happily, put an end to those plans," she said.The seven suspects killed themselves and one police officer on April 3 last year as police raided the apartment building. They set off bombs similar to those used to kill 191 people on four crowded commuter trains in the attacks of March 11 — one of Europe's worst terror attacks. Ms Sanchez said the group, who included the suspected ringleaders of the cell behind the train bombings, "had no intention of committing suicide" but were instead bent on launching more attacks from April 4, 2004. That was the deadline they had fixed for Spain to meet their demand for the withdrawal of its troops from the US-led military deployment in Iraq. Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, who took over as Prime Minister in elections on March 14, three days after the train attacks, announced after his victory he was pulling those soldiers out as per an electoral promise. Posted by: tipper 2005-03-10 |
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