Brother of Glasgow airport attacker jailed

Published on Friday 11 April 2008 13:30

THE brother of a terrorist who died in an airport suicide attack was today jailed for 18 months for withholding information about the plot.

Sabeel Ahmed, an NHS doctor, was sent a chilling e-mail about the mission two days before his older brother Kafeel rammed a jeep into the air terminal in Glasgow.

In it he wrote: "This is the project that I was working on for some time now. Everything else was a lie".

"It's about time that we give up our lives and our families for the sake of Islam to please Allah."

Sabeel pleaded guilty at the Old Bailey to withholding information about terrorism, which carries a maximum sentence of five years.

But the tariff was reduced because he did not read the e-mail until the evening after the attack had taken place.

Because he has already served half his sentence on remand and has agreed to leave the country, the 26-year-old was tonight being released into the custody of the immigration service to be deported back to India.

Mr Justice Calvert-Smith said it was clear from the e-mail his brother sent that he expected to die in the attack, and that his body would be left unrecognisable.

He told Sabeel: "I accept that so far as you personally were concerned there is no sign of your being an extremist or party to extremist views."

However, the judge said, he had agreed to tell police his brother's cover story that he was away in Iceland working on a global warming project.