Spain puts 24 on trial over support for 9/11 attackers

Europe's biggest court case against Islamist extremists opens in Madrid today with 24 suspected members of al Qaeda accused of plotting on Spanish soil the terror attacks of 11 September.

The chief suspect is Syrian-born Imad Eddin Barakat Yarkas, known as Abu Dahdah, who is accused of masterminding the provision of logistical cover for the suicide pilots who launched one of the attacks on the Twin Towers in 2001.

Mr Yarkas, 42, a naturalised Spaniard, is said to have protected Mohamed Atta and others believed to have flown one of the planes. He faces 25-year sentences for each of the 2,973 victims of the attacks.

The trial is the culmination of eight years of investigation by Spain's Judge Baltazar Garzon.

Islamist militants leading quiet lives as businessmen, labourers and waiters were found to have operated in Spain for years, allegedly recruiting men for terrorist training in Afghanistan and laundering money for al Qaeda.

Others in the dock include Moroccan-born Driss Chebli, 33, accused of helping Mr Yarkas arrange a planning meeting in Spain in July 2001 attended by Atta; and Syrian-born Ghasoub Al Abrash Ghayoun, 39, who recorded detailed video footage of the World Trade Centre while visiting the US in 1997.

Those tapes "formed the preliminary information on the attacks", Judge Garzon wrote in an indictment in September 2003 against the three men, and 32 others.

Also indicted was Abu Qutada, a Syrian cleric freed last month in Britain when anti-terrorism provisions expired.

Spanish law permits the prosecution of terrorist crimes committed elsewhere.

Judge Garzon justifies his case on the grounds that the plot was partly hatched in Spain.

Mr Yarkas's lawyer said prosecutors "have no solid evidence of anything".

Those standing trial were detained in raids throughout Spain that began in November 2001. Another 41 men indicted are held outside Spain, or are on the run.

The only person convicted over the 11 September attacks is Moroccan-born Munir al-Motassadeq, who last year won an appeal against his conviction in Germany and is being retried.

- INDEPENDENT