Dragon Mart bomb plotters jailed for 10 years

The two Chinese Uighurs accused of plotting to attack the Dragon Mart in Dubai are sentenced to 10 years in prison by the Federal Supreme Court.

ABU DHABI // The two Chinese Uighurs accused of plotting to attack the Dragon Mart in Dubai were sentenced to 10 years in prison today by the Federal Supreme Court. MB, 31, and WG, 35, were charged with attempting an attack the shopping mall and being members of a terrorist organisation, the East Turkistan Islamic Movement, which calls for the creation of a separate homeland for that area's largely Muslim population. The two defendants were arrested, according to court officials, while they were obtaining materials to create a bomb. Judicial sources said the men wanted the attack, planned for a statue outside the trading centre, to be "symbolic", directed against the Chinese government, and they did not intend cause casualties. But experts told the court the materials they intended to use for the attack would cause "big" damage. According to the UAE law, defendants convicted of terrorism-related charges are sentenced to death. The sentence can, however, be reduced. The sentence was reduced to 10 years because they were in the "preliminary stages" of planning an attack. The Dragon Mart is the world's largest trading centre for Chinese goods outside mainland China, according to its website. [e-mail]