An al-Qaeda suspect who learnt how to blow up an aircraft on the internet at a Belfast library was today jailed for six years at Belfast Crown Court. The Algerian was tried as Abbas Boutrab, 27, but his true identity remains unclear. He has used at least seven aliases since his first known arrest in Paris 13 years ago.| "My real name? It's... ummm... I don't remember." |
Detectives from the Police Service of Northern Ireland crime operations department, the security services, the FBI and police in the Irish Republic, France and Holland, were all involved in the intelligence operation that led to Boutrab’s capture. He was arrested after an immigration raid on his flat at Whiteabbey on the northern outskirts of Belfast in April 2003. Police seized 25 computer discs containing instructions that had been downloaded from the internet in the city’s Central Library three months earlier. Librarians said that they never suspected the unassuming figure poring over Arabic-language websites could be a terrorist. It emerged in court that the files detailed how to construct a bomb and smuggle it on board a passenger jet. They also included information on how to make a silencer for an assault rifle using household items.
Boutrab, who still protests his innocence and plans to appeal the conviction, was also found guilty of possessing a stolen Italian passport. His head shaven and with a black beard, he refused to stand throughout the sentencing. Mr Justice Weatherup told him that he would be recommending his deportation after he has served his sentence. Police say that Boutrab has an allegiance to a terrorist group linked to the al-Qaeda network. He was the first suspected member of the Islamic extremists to be tried in Northern Ireland under the non-jury Diplock court system used for the trial of loyalist and republican paramilitaries.
During the investigation, PSNI detectives sent the instructions they had seized to the FBI where one of the agents followed them. A video showing the results was played to the court: it showed a bomb which blew apart a mocked-up row of airline seats and ripped through the aircraft shell beside them. After Boutrab’s conviction the officer who led the investigation, Detective Superintendent Esmond Adair, said a dangerous man had been removed from the streets. "I believe he is an unrepentant terrorist," he claimed. Boutrab has already spent two years on remand, meaning he could be released in a year’s time under rules for good behaviour.