Germans Convict Sept. 11 Cell-Mate

But Moroccan Is Acquitted Of Direct Involvement In Attacks On U.S.

(AP)  Schudt ordered el Motassadeq taken into custody as Friday's session ended, and two police officers stood by the defendant as reporters left the courtroom.

At the retrial, which opened last August, the U.S. Justice Department provided summaries from the interrogation of Binalshibh and other suspects, but it did not make the full reports available to the court or allowed the captives to appear in person.

"How are we supposed to do justice to our task when important documents are withheld from us?" Judge Schudt asked after Friday's verdict.

According to the statements, Binalshibh — believed to have been the Hamburg cell's liaison with al Qaeda — said that he and the three suicide pilots alone comprised the cell. Prosecutors have argued that he lied to protect the defendant.

"This material on its own had no value as evidence," Schudt said, citing concerns over how the statements may have been obtained. Defense lawyers have argued that they may have been obtained using torture — making them unusable by a German court.

El Motassadeq is one of two people to have been charged in Germany over the attacks.

The other, el Motassadeq's friend and fellow Moroccan Abdelghani Mzoudi, was tried on identical charges. However, he was acquitted for lack of evidence last year by another panel of Hamburg judges.

Germany's top security official welcomed el Motassadeq's conviction and said he was confident that it would survive an appeal.

"With this verdict, a clear signal has been sent of the determination of the state in the fight against terrorism," Interior Minister Otto Schily said in a statement.

The only person charged in the U.S. with involvement in the attacks, Zacarias Moussaoui, pleaded guilty in April.

A Spanish court is expected to deliver its verdict next month in a trial against alleged members of an al Qaeda cell in Spain — including three men accused of using that country as a staging ground to plot the Sept. 11 attacks.