Terror plot

The jury at the Woolwich Crown Court in London found the three men, Abdulla Ahmed Ali, Assad Sarwar and Tanvir Hussain, guilty of planning to kill passengers in mid-flight using liquid explosives disguised as soft drinks. The three will be sentenced next week.

The prosecution said the attacks would have "exceeded the carnage" of the September 11 attacks in the US in 2001 and would have "inflicted heavy casualties in the name of Islam."

British police said on Monday that they believed the group was within days of carrying out the attacks when they were arrested.

"We believe that they were contemplating some sort of dummy run," a British police representative said.

The police source said the men were planning to bomb at least seven airliners one week after this practice run.

British Home Secretary Alan Johnson said he was pleased that three people have been convicted.

"This case reaffirms that we face a real and serious threat from terrorism," Johnson said.

"This was a ... daring plot which would have led to a terrible attack resulting in a major loss of life," he said.

Four other men on trial were found not guilty, while a verdict could not be reached on another man.

US pressure

There have been suggestions that British police were put under pressure to act sooner than planned by US security agencies and that British police would otherwise not have made the arrests as soon as they did.

But British police have rejected the suggestion and said they moved because it was too risky not to.

The arrests in August 2006 led to tightened restrictions on carrying liquids on commercial flights. The discovery of the plot also led to the cancellation of more than 1,000 flights in Britain at the time.

ca/AP/AFP/Reuters/dpa
Editor: Nancy Isenson