Airliner bombers given life terms by Somalian military court

Two men blamed for the bombing of an airliner that made an emergency landing with a gaping hole in its fuselage have been given life in jail.

A military court in Mogadishu, the capital of Somalia, convicted the pair of masterminding the bombing in February of the Daallo Airlines Airbus A321, which was rocked by an explosion about 15 minutes after it took off from the city’s airport with 75 passengers on board.

Abdiweli Mohamed Maow, a former senior security officer at the Mogadishu airport, was convicted of preparing the laptop computer used to bomb the plane. Areys Hashi Abdi was convicted in absentia.

The attack, which was claimed by the Islamic extremist group al-Shabab, killed one passenger, Abdullahi Abdisalam Borle, who was thought to be the suicide bomber. A body believed to be Borle’s was found in a town north of Mogadishu.

Somalia’s military court also convicted eight other people, including a woman, for their roles in planning the bombing and sentenced them to between six months and four years in jail. Six other suspects were acquitted and ordered freed from custody.

Read More- The Guardian

Image courtesy of AP