Plot to blow up court could have killed 1,000 people

THIRTY men have gone on trial for allegedly plotting to blow up a court that is the hub of Spain’s anti-terror investigations.

Alleged mastermind Abderrahmane Tahiri is accused of plotting to ram a truck loaded with 500kg of explosives into the National Court in downtown Madrid — an attack that investigative Judge Fernando Grande-Marlaska said could have killed up to 1,000 people.

The indictment called Tahiri the leader of an “organised and structured terrorist group” committed to waging violent Islamic jihad, or holy war, on Spanish targets.

“With that explosion, they hoped to kill the persons within and destroy the files held against the ‘mujahedeen brotherhood’ inside,” an indictment said.

The 30 men have been charged with membership of a terrorist organisation, conspiracy to commit a terrorist attack and forgery. Nineteen are Algerian, five — including Tahiri — are Moroccan, and the others are from Spain, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Mauritania and the Palestinian territories.

Their trial is expected to last several months.

Police uncovered the alleged plot with the help of an unnamed informant who had lived with some of the accused and Tahiri was extradited from Switzerland in April 2005.

Investigative Judge Baltasar Garzon said earlier that Tahiri set up a cell known as the Martyrs for Morocco while in a Spanish prison for credit card fraud between 1999 and 2002.