British terror suspects ordered held
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-08-19 10:55

British terror suspects in a plot linked to security alerts at U.S. financial targets made their first court appearance Wednesday inside a high-security prison, and were ordered to remain in custody.

After being driven to London's Belmarsh prison in police vans accompanied by armed escorts and a helicopter, the eight were brought into a court room flanked by two guards each.

They were held in the dock behind glass.

Former U. S. weapons inspector David Kay testifies on recomendations of the Sept. 11 commission on Capitol Hill Wednesday, Aug. 18, 2004, before the Senate Intelligence Committee.  [AP]

The suspects were ordered to be detained until they appear in a week at Britain's main criminal court, the Old Bailey.

They will be given a chance at a later date to enter a plea to charges of conspiracy to commit murder and to use explosives, chemicals or radioactive materials to cause disruption, fear or injury.

One, Dhiren Barot, 32, was also accused of having plans for four financial targets that were the subject of U.S. alerts -- the Prudential building in New Jersey, the New York Stock Exchange and Citigroup headquarters in New York, and the International Monetary Fund in Washington.

U.S. officials have said Barot is the man they have named over the past two weeks as Abu Eissa al-Hindi or Abu Musa al-Hindi and described as a top al Qaeda operative in Britain.

HASTY RAIDS

The other suspects are Omar Abdur Rehman, 20, Zia Ul Haq, 25, Abdul Aziz Jalil, 31, Nadeem Tarmohamed, 26, Mohammed Naveed Bhatti, 24, Quaisir Shaffi, 25 and Junade Feroze, 28.

A ninth man arrested with them also appeared on charges of possessing an illegal firearm.

He pleaded not guilty and was freed on bail.

Britain has arrested more than 600 terror suspects since the Sept. 11 attacks but has charged fewer than 100 and convicted only 15 of terrorism offenses.

The raids two weeks ago -- carried out in evident haste after the U.S. alert, with some suspects pulled from shops and others held in a high-speed car chase -- had a more urgent tone than previous anti-terrorism swoops.

U.S. officials said they imposed the alert in the United States because they had discovered reports showing detailed plans of the financial targets, following the July arrest in Pakistan of Mohammed Naeem Noor Khan, 25.

Pakistani intelligence sources say Khan, an al Qaeda communications expert, cooperated with the authorities to help catch his al Qaeda contacts abroad.

But the undercover sting operation was compromised when his name appeared in U.S. newspapers the morning after Washington announced its alert. Britain swooped on the suspects the next day in coordinated raids across the country.

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