US economy ‘was bin Laden target’

Saajid Badat recounted his meeting with the al-Qaida founder in videotaped testimony that was played yesterday to a federal jury in Brooklyn, New York City.

“So he said the American economy is like a chain,” Badat said. “If you break one link of the chain, the whole economy will be brought down. So after the September 11 attacks, this operation will ruin the aviation industry and in turn the whole economy will come down.”

Badat, 33, was convicted in London in a 2001 plot to down an American Airlines flight from Paris to Miami with explosives in his shoes. His evidence came in the trial of a man accused in a 2009 plot to attack New York’s subway network with suicide bombs.

Badat said he was supposed to carry out a simultaneous bombing with failed British shoe-bomber Richard Reid. In testimony recorded last month, he said he refused a request to testify in person because he remained under indictment in Boston on charges alleging he conspired with Reid and has been told he would be arrested if he set foot in the US.

The videotape of his testimony was played on Monday, just before the prosecution called to the witness stand a Long Island man who went to Pakistan in 2007 and joined al-Qaida forces in an attack against US soldiers.

Bryant Vinas, who dropped out of US Army training after three weeks, said he recommended al-Qaida bomb a Long Island Rail Road train and a Wal-Mart store.

Vinas said he told others in the summer of 2008 they could leave a suitcase aboard a train, while explosives could be hidden inside a TV being returned to a Wal-Mart.

“It would cause a very big economy hit,” Vinas said. “Wal-Mart is the largest retail store in the country.” He said he was aware that hundreds of people would die. An al-Qaida associate suggested it would be more successful if a suicide bomber destroyed the train and a portion of the tunnel linking Long Island to Manhattan by setting off explosives while in the tunnel, he said. Vinas, 29, of Patchogue on Long Island, has admitted terrorism charges in Brooklyn and become a key government co-operator.

Vinas said he went to Pakistan in 2007 to find a militant Islamic group and within weeks had latched on to a group that attacked American soldiers in Afghanistan.

He said he went on one mission but the group stashed its ammunition and retreated because there were too many active aircraft overhead.

Bothered by altitude sickness, he said, he volunteered to be a suicide bomber but was rejected because he had not undergone enough religious training.

By March 2008, he had linked up with al-Qaida, undergoing training for weeks that included theory about explosives and instructions on how to make portions of a suicide bomber’s outfit, he said.

He said he was arrested in Pakistan after leaving the tribal areas because the fighting season was over and he wanted to find a wife.

Although he was testifying at the trial of Adis Madunjanin, Vinas said he did not know the principal characters involved in the plot to attack Manhattan subways in 2009. Medunjanin has denied involvement.

Badat said he backed out of the bombing with Reid because of his reluctance, fear and the effect it would have on his family.

Arrested in November 2003, Badat is free after serving six years of an 11-year jail sentence which was reduced because of his co-operation. He said he began co-operating in part because he hoped to give evidence some day against Khalid Sheik Mohammed, who has claimed responsibility while in US custody as the architect of the September 11 attacks.

He said Mohammed gave final orders to himself and Reid, who is serving a life sentence.

Badat said he believed Mohammed and others like him take advantage of vulnerable youths to carry out terrorism attacks.