MADRID (AFP) - The first trial of a suspect implicated in the March 11 train bombings in Madrid opens on Tuesday with a 16-year-old in the dock facing up to eight years in detention for allegedly handling the explosives used in the attack which killed 191 people.
The teen is accused of helping to transport the explosives used in the attacks on four commuter trains which left some 1,900 people injured on top of the fatalities in Spain's worst ever terrorist attack.
The prosecution is calling for eight years detention in a youth centre -- rather than jail, because of the age of the accused.
He will appear in court hidden by a screen at the trial, set to last three days and at which cameramen and photographers will be banned, in line with all hearings of minors.
Nicknamed El Gitanillo (little gypsy) he is one of 19 suspects held on suspicion of involvement in the attacks. The majority are Moroccan nationals.
Warrants have been issued for six fugitive suspects while seven others blew themselves up in a police raid on a flat a southern suburb of Madrid on April 3.
Examinining magistrate Juan del Olmo, who in all has identified 32 suspects believed connected with the blasts, is hoping to complete work on his dossier before the first anniversary of the bombings, judicial sources assert.
The teen, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was detained on June 16 on the same day as a former miner from the northern region of Asturias.
The youth is believed to have become caught up in a network of drug dealers who, the Spanish authorities say, traded explosives stolen from the mines for drugs, selling the dynamite to the bombers who blew up the trains packed with early morning commuters.
The teen suspect is accused of having knowingly helped to transport some 20 kilogrammes by bus to Madrid, where he transferred the material to contacts in a bar.
One of those contacts, Del Olmo believes, was Jamal Ahmidan, one of seven people who blew themselves up in a police raid in the Madrid suburb of Leganes during a police raid on April 3.
According to judicial sources, the 16-year-old was paid around 1,000 euros (1,200 dollars) for his help which he has admitted to investigators.
In late February, the teen is alleged to have gone to a mine with another suspect, former miner Emilio Suarez, who, it is alleged, then met Ahmidan and two other suspects, Abdenabi Kounjaa and Mohamed Oulad Akcha at his home two days later.
Suarez is understood to have then sent his young accomplice back to Madrid on March 4, a week before the attacks, where he again is alleged to have met up with Akcha.
On the morning of March 11, the bombers placed bags containing the explosives on four trains which they set off via mobile phone within minutes of each other at three packed railway stations -- Atocha, a major interchange in central Madrid, Pozo and Santa Eugenia.
Spain's former conservative government initially blamed the blasts on Basque separatist group ETA, which was last December caught red-handed plotting to blow up a mainline train.
However, evidence swiftly emerged fingering radical Muslims seeking to punish Spain for supporting the US-led war in Iraq.
The evidence included a tape containing Koranic verses found in a lorry containing dozens of detonators outside the station from where the deadly trains left. A video was later discovered containing a claim of responsibility in the name of Al-Qaeda.
Three days after the blasts the government lost power as the Socialist Party secured an unexpected general election win.
Many voters turned against the rightwing Popular Party, which had looked set to win the poll easily, amid allegations it tried to mislead the electorate by insisting ETA was responsible for an act of terror which brought more than 10 million Spaniards out on the streets in a March 12 show of solidarity.
11/14/2004 - 03:57 GMT - AFP