AS A New York court convicted three men on charges of trying to blow up American commercial airliners, the White House has revealed plans for an air safety package costing $6 billion over 10 years.
One of the accused, Ramzi Ahmed Yousef, from Kuwait with a Palestinian father, will later this year be tried for his alleged role in the bombing of the World Trade Centre in February 1993. Until his arrest in Pakistan last year the US considered Yousef the most wanted fugitive with a $2 million reward for his capture.
The Manhattan federal court also convicted Abdul Hakim Murad and Wali Khan Amin Shah on the charges of plotting to blow up the airliners and to kill Americans travelling outside the US. They all face mandatory life sentences.
Yousef (28), an electrical engineer, was also convicted on the separate charge of planting a test bomb on a Philippine airlines jetliner bound for Tokyo that killed a Japanese passenger in 1994.
Federal investigators have indicated that if the explosion of the TWA Flight 800 airliner off Long Island last July is declared a criminal act, followers of Yousef are potential suspects.
Lawyers for the three men say that the jury may have been influenced against them by the publicity surrounding the crash. But the judge ruled during the trial that the jurors would not be affected by speculation that Yousef or his followers might have been involved.
The TWA crash led to the setting up of a commission on air safety headed by Vice President Al Gore. The commission has now made a series of proposals which President Clinton is expected to approve next week.
The measures include immediate 300 million government funding to buy the most sophisticated bomb detection equipment for the major airports in the US. There would also be a 60 day test of matching bags with passengers on domestic flights; the profiling of passengers by computer to assess them as security risks; better training of screening personnel; and more sniffer dogs.