Spain awaits Madrid bombing trial verdicts

A Spanish court will reveal verdicts today on 28 people accused of the Madrid train bombings. The case is Europe’s biggest Islamic terror trial.

Security forces have been put on alert and new memorial services are being prepared for the 191 people killed when 10 nail bombs exploded on commuter trains in 2004.

A three-judge panel will read out verdicts and sentences following nearly five months of testimony by hundreds of witnesses, arguments by more than 40 lawyers, and sporadic hunger strikes by several of the defendants – mostly young Muslim men of North African origin accused of executing the plot out of allegiance to Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaida network.

The top eight defendants each face nearly 39,000-year sentences if convicted on all charges, although under Spanish law they can spend no more than 40 years behind bars.

They face charges ranging from forgery to murder and conspiracy to commit a terrorist attack.

One man had charges against him dropped during the trial, and another was released on bail in September, in a possible sign that judges believe he does not pose a threat.

Seven suspected ringleaders in the case blew themselves up as police closed in on a suburban Madrid flat about three weeks after the March 11 attacks. Most of those left to stand trial were considered secondary figures.

A two-year investigation concluded the group was inspired by al-Qaida, but had no direct links to it, nor did it receive financing from bin Laden’s terrorist organisation, Spanish investigators say.

Unlike the September 11 2001 attacks, which temporarily united Americans of all political stripes, the Madrid bombings tore Spanish society apart.

In elections three days after the blasts, voters elected the opposition Socialists and ousted a pro-US government that had sent 1,300 peacekeepers to Iraq. Many Spaniards blamed that administration for the attack, saying it had made the country a target for terrorists by supporting the Iraq war. The Socialists quickly brought the troops home.

The trial proved equally divisive, with the conservative opposition using it to advance a host of conspiracy theories, including unsubstantiated allegations that Basque separatists were involved in the attack, or that members of the Socialist party somehow knew about it beforehand.

Most of the conspiracy theories were shot down by the court, with a conservative politician who was Spain’s police chief at the time of the attacks fined and threatened with jail for refusing to name his source when he testified that an internal police document linked ETA with the blasts.

Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero said he hoped the verdict would “give a definitive answer to those who have put forth absurd and despicable doubts about March 11”.

He asked both political parties to support the ruling and put the acrimony behind them, but that call was unlikely to be heeded, particularly in the midst of a contentious campaign before national elections due next March.

On Monday Angel Acebes, the number two leader of the opposition Popular Party, accused the government of preparing to use the verdict to attack the conservatives.

“We have never used a terrorist attack for electoral gains,” he said. He added that the Socialist party “has done that and continues doing it”, a reference to Zapatero’s victory after the March 11 attacks.

In addition to uncovering the fissures in Spanish society, the trial also shed new light on the spectacular failure of Spanish intelligence in the days before the attack.

The prosecution said Spanish authorities were monitoring several of the alleged bombers in the months before March 11 – and stopped a car carrying several of the alleged plotters in late February.

The prosecution said the car was leading a caravan of terrorists transporting the explosives used in the blasts, but the authorities were unaware of it.

Agents listening to tapped phone conversations among the alleged plotters believed something was being planned, but thought the coded language the men were using was referring to a drug deal.

Following the attacks, police have bolstered security and intelligence operations nationwide, tripling the number of agents concentrating on terrorism and slapping blanket surveillance on 250 suspected radicals, according to intelligence officials speaking on condition of anonymity.

Spain plans further memorial services for the families of the 191 people killed next week. Some 1,800 people were injured in the blasts.