Bin Laden Aide Gets Life for East Africa Attacks
A New York court sentenced Saudi exile Khalid al-Fawwaz to life in prison Friday over his role in the 1998 Al-Qaida bombings of U.S. embassies in East Africa which killed 224 people.
Fawwaz, a 52-year-old described in court as one of late Al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden's most trusted lieutenants, was convicted in February after a five week trial.
The August 7, 1998 bombings of the U.S. embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam, which wounded more than 5,000 people, marked the first major attacks in Al-Qaida's war against the United States.
Federal Judge Lewis Kaplan handed down the life sentence against Fawwaz, who was found guilty on four counts of conspiracy to kill Americans and destroy property.
Arrested in London in September 1998, he has already spent 16 years in custody, most of it fighting extradition to the United States.
U.S. prosecutors said Fawwaz headed one of the original Al-Qaida training camps in the mountains of Afghanistan, led a terrorist cell in Kenya, and spent years shaping and disseminating Al-Qaida's message from London, including bin Laden's 1998 fatwa exhorting supporters to kill Americans around the world.
"Fawwaz was one of Osama bin Laden's original and most trusted lieutenants," U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said after his conviction.
Fawwaz, he said, was ninth on the list of Al-Qaida's original 107 members.
Defense lawyer Bobbi Sternheim, in contrast, described her client as nothing more than a "calm and serene" man who dedicated his life to peaceful reform in his homeland.
She claimed he had never shared the violent views of bin Laden and Al-Qaida, was never a member of Al-Qaida and was only interested in fighting corruption in Saudi Arabia.
Source: Agence France Presse
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