OTTAWA — A British terrorism ringleader was overheard brainstorming about terrorist attacks just after dropping off his houseguest, Canadian terrorism suspect Mohammad Momin Khawaja, at Heathrow Airport, an Ontario Superior Court heard Friday.
Omar Khyam dropped Mr. Khawaja off at the airport on Feb. 22, 2004, and proceeded to meet a friend whose house had been put under surveillance. The conversations turned to talk of Westerners, and how to “put terror in their hearts,” as well as citations of scripture that reads “kill them where you find them.”
“You don't think this place is bugged do you?” Jawad Akbar said in his residence, according to a British surveillance intercept, aired in court Friday.
“No I don't think it's bugged ... at all,” replied Mr. Khyam. “I don't even think the car's bugged.”
Canadian Momin Khawaja arrives at The jeep was bugged and Mr. Khawaja is heard chatting on it withing a few minutes of the photos being taken. This was an MI5 surveillance op.
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- Documents from the trial: transcripts, maps and surveillance images
Part 1 (pdf) - Part 2 (pdf)
- Part 3 (pdf)
- Part 4 (pdf)
Court has heard Mr. Khawaja, who is the first man charged under Canada's Anti-Terrorism Act, arrived in London earlier that weekend and stepped into a sophisticated surveillance dragnet. The spy agency MI5 had been keeping a close eye on the British conspirators when Mr. Khawaja arrived on the scene.
The evidence is that the Canadian was overheard discussing a remote-controlled detonation device. He also made remarks about using his Ottawa work credentials – at the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs – to ship goods to jihadists in Pakistan.
Both these conversations were with Mr. Khyam, the British ringleader, who appears to have talked about terrorism all the time. The Crown is now playing conversations that occurred immediately after Mr. Khawaja left Britain.
Later that evening, a discussion between Mr. Khyam and Mr. Akbar – men in their 20s who are now serving life sentences in Britain for their parts in a bomb plot – involved talk of terror and killing. “The best thing to do is put terror in their hearts, there is no doubt, that is the best thing, there is nothing better that that, we put fear in their hearts,” Mr. Akbar said at one point.
Later, his conversation partner, Mr. Khyam started quoting what he said was scripture. “With your wealth, with your blood ... with your lives, you kill them and be killed,” he said. “The aya (verse) says ‘Lay in ambush for them, besiege them, and kill them where you find them.' “Summing up, he said, “To me that's just clear: Kill them.”
The two men then spoke of seeing footage of alleged atrocities caused by Western-led occupations, including the burned bodies of babies in Iraq. They suggested that the solution to the world's ills was setting up Islamic states.
According to the intercepts, they seemed convinced they had to violently retaliate, yet hadn't decided what to do, and when and how to do it.
At times the two men suggested they could win big points in the afterlife for joining mujahedeen fighters in Pakistan or Afghanistan.
Other times, they brainstormed attacks against Britain. Mr. Akbar suggested inconveniencing the British by bombing the power grid.
Mr. Khyam said they had to think bigger than making the lights go out. “What's the terror about that, bro?”
The ringleader, Mr. Khyam recalled the accidental 1980s lethal chemical leak at a Union Carbide plant in Bopal, India.
“Unless it was a such a big explosion that hundreds of people died, such a big impact bro ... do you know – that big chemical disaster in India?”
Then he added that attacks had to be co-ordinated for maximum impact. “Unless you have a proper plan, simultaneously, it's got to be, yeah, to the extent that it's going to raise eyebrows.”
His friend, Mr. Akbar replied by lamenting that Westerners are so complacent, that it takes a large scale atrocity to get anyone's attention these days.
“The country's culture, is that you never give a crap, even 9/11 ... it's only when you hear about the death toll, yeah.”
He then suggested hitting a club every “Tom, Dick and Harry goes on a Saturday night.
“You could get a job like this for example, the biggest nightclub in central London,” Mr. Akbar continued. “Where now no one can even turn around and say ‘Oh they were innocent',' those slags dancing around and other things.”
He didn't have the resolve for a suicide bombing. “During a martyrdom operation you need to be on another level of imam [faith],” Mr. Akbarsaid. “... I know for a fact I would not do that.”
It's alleged that the Canadian suspect, Mr. Khawaja, was building a remote controlled detonator from the British group when he was arrested in March, 2004. Court has heard evidence that he had joined many of them in a Pakistani training-camp six months prior to meeting conspirators around London during his three-day visit.
