Date set for Madrid train bombings trial

The trial of more than two dozen suspects in the Madrid train bombings will begin on February 15, Spain’s National Court said today.

The March 11, 2004, Madrid bombings killed 191 people and were the country’s worst terrorist attack.

Twenty nine suspects, most of them Moroccan nationals, will take the stand in Spain after a two-year investigation led by Spanish Judge Juan del Olmo.

Seven lead suspects with links to radical Islamic groups will answer charges of murder and belonging to a terrorist organisation. The rest face charges of belonging to or collaborating with a terrorist organisation, weapons possession and other crimes.

Hundreds were injured in the blasts. Many of them lost limbs or were paralysed for life.

Spanish prosecutors have demanded some of the stiffest sentences in Spain’s history for the seven lead suspects, seeking jail terms of more than 38,000 years for each.