Canada: Trial of Khawaja Link to Suicide Bomber

Trial told of Khawaja link to suicide bomber

By DONNA CASEY, SUN MEDIA

The leader of the July 7, 2005, suicide bomb attacks on London's transit system attended the same terrorist training camp as Mohammad Momin Khawaja, according to testimony at the Ottawa man's terror trial.

Mohammed Siddique Khan visited a Islamist paramilitary training camp in the northern region of Pakistan a few weeks after Khawaja returned home to Canada from his July 2003 trip for alleged explosives and weapons training.

The link between Khawaja and Khan was revealed in testimony last week from Muhammed Junaid Babar, the Crown's key witness in the trial of Khawaja, a 29-year-old software designer.

The court also heard Khan was present at meetings with the fertilizer bomb plotters in late February 2004 in London.

Khan's name was covered under a publication ban that was lifted yesterday by Ontario Superior Court Justice Douglas Rutherford, who is presiding over Khawaja's trial.

While Khan died during the July 7, 2005 subway and bus attacks that killed 52 commuters and injured 1,000 others, British prosecutors wanted his name kept under wraps in Khawaja's trial.

Three British men are on trial in London for helping the July 7 bombings and prosecutors feared jurors might read media reports from Khawaja's trial of Khan's involvement in the separate U.K. fertilizer bomb plot.