Spain puts 24 on trial over support for 9/11 attackers

Europe's biggest court case against Islamist extremists opens in Madrid today with 24 suspected members of al-Qa'ida accused of plotting on Spanish soil the terror attacks in the United States of 11 September 2001.The chief suspect is the Syrian-born Imad Eddin Barakat Yarkas, known as Abu Dahdah. He is accused of masterminding the provision of logistical cover for the suicide pilots who launched one of the attacks on the twin towers in New York in 2001.The trial is the culmination of eight years of investigation by Spain's crusading Judge Baltazar Garzon. Islamist militants leading quiet lives as businessmen, labourers and waiters were found to have operated in Spain for years, allegedly recruiting men for terrorist training in Afghanistan, preaching holy war and laundering money for al-Qa'ida.