Glasgow Airport bombing: Doctor behind terror attack is jailed for life

Bilal Abdulla, 29, was unmasked as a terrorist who wanted to murder innocent civilians in revenge for fighting in his native Iraq.

A jury at Woolwich Crown Court found him guilty of conspiracy to murder and to cause explosions yesterday at the end of a nine-week trial.

Mr Justice Mackay told him he was "religious extremist and a bigot" who held the most extreme form of Islamist views.

The junior doctor drove one of two home-made Mercedes car bombs, each packed with gas cylinders, petrol and nails, into London's West End last summer.

He admitted parking the car outside Tiger Tiger, a nightclub packed with more than 500 people, turning on the gas cylinders and splashing the interior with petrol.

His accomplice, Indian PhD engineering student Kafeel Ahmed, parked the second vehicle at a nearby bus stop.

As the two men escaped, they dialled the numbers of hand-made mobile-phone detonators left in the vehicles.

But the devices failed because of loose electrical connections and the smothering effect of the thick gas and petrol fumes.

The discovery of two car bombs in Haymarket and adjoining Cockspur Street sparked a nationwide manhunt.

The two men fled to their bomb factory in a rented family home in Houston, on the outskirts of Glasgow. Abdulla worked nearby at the Royal Alexandra Hospital.

The next day they launched a desperate suicide attack on Glasgow Airport in a powerful Jeep loaded with gas cylinders and petrol.

Counter terrorist police said the London attacks were intended to be the first strikes in a wave of terrorist atrocities.

The court heard how the two men purchased five second-hand cars and had enough material for two more detonators.

Abdulla, who holds dual Iraqi and British nationality, was motivated by the suffering of his fellow Iraqis, the court heard.

Abdulla's close friend Jordanian neurologist Mohammed Asha, 28, was acquitted of the same charges.

He was beginning his legal battle against deportation today after pledging to stay in Britain to continue his medical training.