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29/01/2008
'Fanatic' Planned to Film Beheading
A Birmingham man has admitted to plotting the kidnapping of a British soldier and planning to cut his head off “like a pig” on camera.
Islamist Parviz Khan, an unemployed charity worker, was ringleader to a gang of four men engaged in the plot to make an example of a Muslim service man, Leicester Crown Court heard.
Nigel Rumfitt QC told the jury Mr Khan hoped to kidnap the soldier in central Birmingham using the help of local drug dealers, and added that Khan had been "a fanatic" at the centre of an Islamist terrorist "cell" based in the Birmingham area.
"He would be taken to a lock-up garage and there he would be murdered by having his head cut off like a pig." said the QC.
"This atrocity would be filmed ... and the film released to cause panic and fear within the British armed forces and the wider public."
The three other men involved, Basiru Gassama, 30, Mohammed Irfan, 31, and Hamid Elasmar, 44, have admitted other offences connected with Khan's plot.
Khan, 37, also admitted intending to supply equipment to Muslim forces in the Middle East; on the border of Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Security forces had bugged the house of Khan, where evidence was accumulated detailing Khan’s activity in gathering military equipment such as night-vision goggles, and eventually to the uncovering of the macabre plot to mutilate a Muslim military serviceman.
During 2005 and 2006 he also visited a freight company in Birmingham to organise shipments weighing up to a tonne to be sent to Pakistan.
The cargoes, listed as aid for earthquake victims, included sleeping bags, walkie-talkies and waterproof map-holders ordered by contacts in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
(DW)
Islamist Parviz Khan, an unemployed charity worker, was ringleader to a gang of four men engaged in the plot to make an example of a Muslim service man, Leicester Crown Court heard.
Nigel Rumfitt QC told the jury Mr Khan hoped to kidnap the soldier in central Birmingham using the help of local drug dealers, and added that Khan had been "a fanatic" at the centre of an Islamist terrorist "cell" based in the Birmingham area.
"He would be taken to a lock-up garage and there he would be murdered by having his head cut off like a pig." said the QC.
"This atrocity would be filmed ... and the film released to cause panic and fear within the British armed forces and the wider public."
The three other men involved, Basiru Gassama, 30, Mohammed Irfan, 31, and Hamid Elasmar, 44, have admitted other offences connected with Khan's plot.
Khan, 37, also admitted intending to supply equipment to Muslim forces in the Middle East; on the border of Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Security forces had bugged the house of Khan, where evidence was accumulated detailing Khan’s activity in gathering military equipment such as night-vision goggles, and eventually to the uncovering of the macabre plot to mutilate a Muslim military serviceman.
During 2005 and 2006 he also visited a freight company in Birmingham to organise shipments weighing up to a tonne to be sent to Pakistan.
The cargoes, listed as aid for earthquake victims, included sleeping bags, walkie-talkies and waterproof map-holders ordered by contacts in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
(DW)
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