Alex Constantine - February 19, 2011
A terrorist who was jailed for founding a training camp where the leader of the July 7 London suicide bombers were taught to make bombs has been released from prison after serving less than five years, it was claimed.
The Telegraph | February 14, 2011
American Mohammed Junaid Babar walked free just four and a half years into a sentence that could have lasted as long as 70, prompting claims he may have been acting as an informant.
The decision to sentence him to "time served" due to what a New York judge termed his "exceptional co-operation" dating back to before his arrest led to suggestions Babar could have been helping US authorities even while helping to train the man who led the 2005 attacks on London.
Babar had admitted being a jihadist connected with senior al-Qaeda figures as he pleaded guilty to five counts of terrorism in a New York court in 2004. He agreed to plead guilty and become a supergrass for the government in exchange for a significantly shortened sentence in a deal with American prosecutors, The Guardian reported.
Babar's release was compared by lawyers acting on behalf of the families of victims to the decision to let Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, the Lockerbie bomber, leave prison.
