AseanNow : Minh Pham arrived in Britain as a six-year-old refugee, fleeing the turmoil of post-war Vietnam with his family. Decades later, he admitted to a shocking betrayal—plotting a suicide bombing at Heathrow Airport on behalf of al-Qaeda, intending to kill hundreds of innocent people during the Christmas season.
Read it all here.......Al-Qaeda leaders directed Pham to strike the airport’s arrivals hall, where he would not need to pass through security. His bomb was to be packed with shrapnel coated in rat poison to maximize casualties. Prosecutors in the United States, where Pham was recently sentenced, revealed chilling details of his preparations. Footage recovered from a laptop in Yemen showed him constructing and testing explosives, grinning as he practiced triggering detonators while wearing a rucksack. “In the real world, that green light could mean dozens, or even hundreds, of deaths,” prosecutors stated.
The same laptop contained a six-page document titled “Your Instructions,” written by Anwar al-Awlaki, the infamous American-born al-Qaeda leader. Awlaki provided Pham with precise directions, including the suggestion to poison the shrapnel. This newly uncovered evidence directly contradicted Pham’s previous claims that he never intended to carry out an attack on UK soil.
Pham’s planned attack was set for 2011, but his capture prevented it from happening. Intelligence agencies warn that terrorist groups like al-Qaeda and ISIS are regrouping, aiming to launch large-scale attacks once again. Sir Ken McCallum, director-general of MI5, recently warned, “Organised groups have the numbers and the know-how to carry out, or inspire, horrendous mass casualty attacks.”
Last month, Pham, now 42, was sentenced to 44 years in a maximum-security US prison after pleading guilty to multiple terrorism charges. His case marks the end of a 15-year saga spanning three continents and leaving a fractured family behind.
Pham’s journey began in 1983 when he was born in Vietnam. Just a month later, his parents fled the war-ravaged country, making the perilous journey by boat to Hong Kong. They spent six years in a refugee camp before being granted asylum in Britain in 1989, settling in south London. His father worked as a cleaner, while his mother raised Pham and his three younger siblings. The family became British citizens in 1995.
No comments:
Post a Comment
I do not aim to please anyone. This is my blog, there is no blog like this. I am not mainstream. Read my disclaimer before posting comments and threatening me. Not to worry, I will not quiver in my boots. If you are not happy, no problem, just take a hike!!