Australian terror cell member jailed for 5 years

MELBOURNE, Australia — The last of eight men convicted of being part of a terrorist cell that planned to kill hundreds of people with a bombing in Australia’s second largest city was sentenced on Wednesday to five years in prison.

Shane Kent, a 32-year-old Australian-born convert to Islam, pleaded guilty in the Victoria state Supreme Court in July to charges that he was part of a terrorist organization and made a film in preparation for a terrorist act.

Justice Bernard Bongiorno sentenced Kent to five years in prison. The judge said he could not accept Kent’s claim that he had renounced his commitment to violent jihad, or holy war.

Kent will be eligible for parole in nine months.

He underwent military training at a terrorist camp in Afghanistan a month before the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States.

Another seven members of a Melbourne-based cell were convicted of terrorism-related offenses last year, but a jury had been unable to reach a verdict on Kent’s charges.

He pleaded guilty on the day his retrial was scheduled to start.

The group’s leader, Algerian-born cleric Abdul Nacer Benbrika, 48, was sentenced in February to 15 years in prison for his role. He must serve at least 12 years behind bars.

Six of his followers were sentenced to prison terms ranging from four to seven-and-a-half years.

Prosecutors said Benbrika urged his followers in 2004 and 2005 to launch an attack to force the Australian government to withdraw its troops from Afghanistan and Iraq. He told them an attack needed to kill at least 1,000 people to achieve this aim, and that it was permissible to kill women, children and the elderly.

No attack took place but prosecutors said the group identified Melbourne railway stations and sports stadiums as possible targets.