GERMANY: Five relatives of September 11th victims yesterday confronted the man on trial in Germany for supporting the attacks, recounting with emotion their suffering since their loved ones were killed and demanding justice.
The five co-plaintiffs sat facing the defendant, Mr Mounir El Motassadeq. The Moroccan student has been charged in Hamburg with being an accessory to 3,045 murders in New York and Washington DC.
Mr Stephen Push, whose wife, Lisa, died on the hijacked plane that crashed into the Pentagon, told the Hamburg court: "I am testifying because I believe, before the court delivers its verdict, it should hear the human side of the tragedy.
"I believe the punishment for the crime should be commensurate with the magnitude of the loss and suffering," Mr Push said.
He told the five judges he would lie awake wondering how his wife had suffered, and whether she had been killed quickly by attackers sitting next to her or had time to take in her imminent death. He told of their hopes of retiring in California and her dream of writing a novel. "She was only 42 years old. The terrorists stole half of her life. I believe it would have been the better half," Mr Push said.
Ms Deena Burnett, whose husband, Tom, led the charge against the hijackers on the plane that crashed in a Pennsylvania field, told of four harrowing calls from the flight as her husband resolved to storm the cockpit.
She held aloft a picture of her three daughters and urged the court: "Like Tom, you have the advantage of time and information to act and make a difference ...
"My request to you is to show the same courage as Tom by holding the defendant responsible for the criminal acts of terrorism and murder."
Mr Motassadeq, only a few metres away, sat impassively through the testimonies.
Mr Push said he did not expect to sway the court's judgment, but urged the judges to take the personal stories into account for sentencing in the event of a guilty verdict, hoping they would not accept that Mr Motassadeq was a minor player.
"I hope a German court in particular would not accept that, as a half century earlier those involved in the Holocaust tried to limit their guilt with similar claims," he said.
Ms Maureen Fanning, whose 54-year-old firefighter husband was killed trying to save lives in the World Trade Centre, told how she struggled to make their two autistic sons understand how their father had died when the second tower fell.
"The boys have very little in their lives. They cannot read or write. They have no friends ringing on the doorbells. They had Jack to enter the door with a smile. That was stolen from them on September 11th," she said.
"The defendant has chosen to associate himself with the forces of evil. Under the guise of religion he has shown himself to be educated and brainwashed in hate and evil," she said, demanding that he be imprisoned for life.
Prosecutors, who are expected to conclude their case soon, say Mr Motassadeq was a vital cog in the Hamburg al-Qaeda cell run by Muhammad Atta, who, US authorities believe, flew the first plane which smashed into the World Trade Centre.
Lawyers for the 28-year-old Moroccan electrical engineering student say he did little more than befriend the Hamburg-based attackers and help some out as fellow Muslims.
The accused man, who says he is innocent, could face life in prison if found guilty by Hamburg's Higher Regional Court.