9/11 accused Moussaoui 'plans to plead guilty'

Zacarias Moussaoui, the only person in the US charged over the September 11 terrorist attacks, has told the US government he plans to plead guilty, it is reported today.

The Washington Post quoted sources familiar with the case as saying that if a judge found Moussaoui mentally competent, he could enter the plea as early as this week.

The US government accused Moussaoui of participating in an al-Qaida conspiracy to commit terrorism that included the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Centre in New York and the Pentagon in Washington.

Contacted early today, prosecutors and defence lawyers declined to comment on the Post report.

Moussaoui, a French citizen of Moroccan descent, tried to plead guilty in 2002 but then retracted the plea a week later.

The Post sources said US District Judge Leonie Brinkema in Alexandria, Virginia, was due to meet Moussaoui this week to determine if he had the mental capacity to enter a plea.

Moussaoui was indicted in December 2001, but his trial has been delayed three times. In March the Supreme Court agreed with a lower appeals court that Moussaoui could not have access to three al-Qaida witnesses and that the government could seek the death penalty.