NEW YORK (Agencies)
Faisal Shahzad, who pleaded guilty to driving a bomb-laden car into New York’s Times Square, told investigators that if he hadn’t been arrested within days of the foiled May 1 attack, he planned to detonate a second bomb in New York City two weeks later, prosecutors said on Wednesday
Shahzad also told investigators that he made use of real-time video on the Internet of Times Square to maximize the deadly effect of his bomb.
Faisal Shahzad should get life in prison when he is sentenced Oct. 5, prosecutors said in a filing, arguing that he "had every intention of delivering a powerful and terrorizing strike to the heart of New York City."
The government noted that Shahzad showed no remorse when he pleaded guilty on June 21 after confessing to investigators.
In fact, prosecutors wrote, "he spoke with pride about what he and his co-conspirators had done."
Included in the government submission to the sentencing judge in U.S. District Court in Manhattan was a 40-minute video in which Shahzad fires a machine gun in what appears to be the mountains of Pakistan as he announces that he has met members of the Pakistan Taliban and has decided "we are going to raise an attack inside America."
Prosecutors also included a video of the government's explosion of a bomb the size of Shahzad's, saying the results in a Pennsylvania field show the attack would have been "devastating to the surrounding area" had it succeeded.
Through most of the first video, Shahzad is seated and quoting from the Quran but makes his intentions clear toward the end when he states: "I have been trying to join my brothers in jihad ever since Sept.11 happened. I am planning to wage an attack inside America," prosecutors said.
Shahzad was arrested two days after his May 1 bomb attempt in tourist-filled Times Square, where the explosives he had packed into the back of a sports utility vehicle sputtered and failed to detonate.
Prosecutors said he tried to ignite the bomb before he abandoned the vehicle and that he was "prepared to conduct additional attacks until he was captured or killed." The government did not list other locations that Shahzad might have chosen as targets.
A lawyer for Shahzad did not immediately return a request for comment Wednesday.
Shahzad chose a warm Saturday evening to carry out his attack in a part of Times Square he believed would be most crowded based on streaming video of the world-famous tourist magnet that he'd looked at online, prosecutors said.
He lit the fuse of his bomb, then left the vehicle to head to Grand Central terminal and, from there, his Connecticut home, pausing along the way to listen for the explosion that never came, the filing said.
A street vendor spotted smoke coming from the SUV and alerted police, who quickly cleared the area. The bomb attempt set off an intense investigation that culminated two days later with investigators plucking Shahzad off a Dubai-bound plane at a New York airport.
The government made clear that much of its information came from Shahzad, who waived his right not to incriminate himself.
“Brave effort”
" I want to plead guilty and I'm going to plead guilty a hundred times forward "
Faisal Shahzad,Prosecutors quoted extensively from the video that they said was posted online by the Pakistan Taliban on July 14, titled "A brave effort by Faisal Shahzad to attack United States in its own Land."
Prosecutors said the video, which includes publicly released photographs taken in Times Square following the attempted bombing, includes a segment in which Shahzad explains that "jihad is one of the pillars upon which Islam stands" and later advises that "Jews and Christians have to accept Islam as a religion and if you don't do that, then you are bound to go in hellfire."
The Pakistan-born Shahzad, 30, pleaded guilty to 10 terrorism and weapons counts, some of which carry mandatory life sentences.
"I want to plead guilty and I'm going to plead guilty a hundred times forward," he said.
He defiantly called himself a Muslim soldier at the proceeding and warned that unless the U.S. leaves Muslim lands alone, "we will be attacking U.S., and I plead guilty to that."
He admitted that the Pakistan Taliban provided him with more than $15,000 and five days of explosives training late last year and early this year, months after he became a U.S. citizen.
Then, he said, he built his fertilizer-fueled bomb packed in a gun cabinet, with a set of propane tanks and gas canisters rigged with fireworks to explode into a fireball.
He also revealed that he was carrying a folding assault rifle, which he said was for self-defense. Prosecutors said in their court document that Shahzad had practiced firing the gun at a range in Connecticut "to ensure he was fully prepared if confronted by law enforcement authorities."
Prosecutors noted the irony of Shahzad's plans to attack the United States, where he'd succeeded academically and professionally over the past decade and created a life with his wife and two young children that was "full of promise."
They said that much of his personal success was built on opportunities the U.S. had provided, including the chance to earn a college degree while on a student visa and permission to remain in the country on a working visa sponsored by a U.S. company.
He lived comfortably with his family in Connecticut until he chose "a nihilistic path that celebrated conflict and death cloaked in the rhetoric of a distorted interpretation of Islam," prosecutors said.
They added: "The premeditated attempt to kill and maim scores of unsuspecting innocent men, women and children with a homemade bomb can only be described as utterly reprehensible."
http://www.alarabiya.net/articles/2010/09/30/120768.html
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عامل بمبگذاری نافرجام نیویورک 'قصد حمله دیگری را داشت'
دادستان های آمریکایی می گویند که فیصل شهزاد، عامل بمبگذاری نافرجام نیویورک قصد انجام بمبگذاری دیگری را نیز داشته است.
به گفته آنها، متهم می خواسته است که دو هفته پس از بمبگذاری در میدان تایمز، حمله مشابهی را انجام دهد.
دادستان های فدرال برای فیصل شهزاد، که پاکستانی الاصل است، مجازات حبس ابد درخواست کرده اند و می گویند که در جریان بازجویی از اقدام خود ابراز ندامت نکرده است.
به گفته آنها، وی تصور می کرد که حداقل ۴۰ نفر در بمبگذاری میدان تایمز کشته خواهند شد.
قرار است حکم آقای شهزاد پنجم ماه اکتبر صادر شود.
مقام های قضایی آمریکا روز چهارشنبه ویدیویی چهل دقیقه ای از سخنان فیصل شهزاد که پیش از بمبگذاری نافرجام ضبط شده بود را ارائه کردند.
او در این ویدیو می گوید: "من از زمان واقعه ۱۱ سپتامبر تلاش کرده ام که در جهاد برادرانم شرکت کنم. من برنامه دارم که در داخل آمریکا دست به حمله بزنم."
او پیشتر نیز در ویدئویی که شبکه العربیه منتشر کرده بود، حمله در میدان تایمز را انتقام از آنچه بر جنگجویان مسلمان، "شهدا" و "مسلمانان مظلوم و ضعیف" رفته است دانسته بود.
این شهروند آمریکا همه اتهامات وارده در ارتباط با تلاش برای بمبگذاری اول ماه مه را پذیرفته است.
در اول ماه مه خودرویی در میدان تایمز کشف شد که حاوی مقدار زیادی کود شیمیایی، چند کپسول گاز پروپان، چند گالن بنزین و ترقه بود.
صاحب دکه ای در آن نزدیکی متوجه بلند شدن دود از این اتومبیل شد و پلیس را خبر کرد.
آقای شهزاد دو روز بعد درحالی که قصد داشت از فرودگاه جان اف کندی نیویورک به دوبی پرواز کند دستگیر شد.
در ویدئویی که شبکه العربیه منتشر کرد، آقای شهزاد گفته بود: "اسلام در همه دنیا گسترش خواهد یافت و دموکراسی شکست خواهد خورد.... و دنیا جای حکومت برتر خداوند خواهد بود."
بر اساس متن اتهامات، او در جریان بازجویی ها گفت که در دسامبر سال ۲۰۰۹ به منطقه قبیله نشین وزیرستان شمالی پاکستان رفته بود تا نحوه ساختن بمب را از پیکارجویان مرتبط با طالبان پاکستانی بیاموزد.
BBC
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