NEW YORK: A Pakistani man was convicted on Wed­nesday on charges of participating in an Al Qaeda plot to attack targets in Europe and the United States.

Abid Naseer, 28, was found guilty by a federal jury in Brooklyn of providing and conspiring to provide material support to Al Qaeda and conspiring to use a destructive device.

Naseer remained expressionless as the jury returned the verdict after two days of deliberation. He faces life in prison. His lawyer said after the conviction that he would appeal.

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Prosecutors said Naseer headed up an Al Qaeda cell plotting to bomb a shopping centre in Manchester, England, in April 2009.

The proposed attack was one of three plots affiliated Al Qaeda cells were working on, along with attacks agai­nst the New York City subway system and a Copen­hagen newspaper, prosecutors said.

Naseer was convicted nea­r­ly six years after he was first arrested in a British anti-terrorism operation. While British authorities never charged Naseer, he was later indicted in the US and extradited in 2013. Naseer denied any affiliation with Al Qaeda or any plot.

A federal jury recently convicted Khalid al Fawwaz, a Saudi man prosecutors described as an adviser to Osama bin Laden, in connection with the 1998 bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

Published in Dawn, March 5th, 2015

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