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MADRID - A Spanish court will deliver verdicts on 28 people accused of playing a role in the 2004 Madrid train bombings, ending a politically charged trial into Europe's deadliest al Qaeda-inspired attack.
Ten bombs ripped through four commuter trains early on March 11, 2004, strewing the tracks
with bodies. The Islamist bombings killed 191 people and injured 1,800 when mobile phones set off homemade bombs packed into sports bags.
The bombings also reshaped Spanish politics as voters spurned a conservative government that at first blamed the blasts on Basque separatists ETA.
Twenty-nine people, mostly Moroccans and Spaniards, have been tried for crimes ranging from masterminding the attack to stealing dynamite from a mine in northern Spain. One has since been cleared.
In the four and a half month trial, the court heard how petty criminals met in fast food restaurants to plot the bombings.
After a four month break to consider the evidence, Judge Javier Gomez Bermudez will call the court to sit at about 11am (11pm NZT) and read a summary of the trial.
He will then announce which suspects have been found guilty or innocent and read out sentences.
The eight main suspects face multiple sentences that could total 39,000 years for each, although such figures are academic because under Spanish law nobody can stay in prison for more than 40 years.
All suspects have pleaded innocent and most are expected to appeal against their sentences.
The verdicts will close another chapter on the bombings.
But with a general election less than five months away, politicians and the media are still bickering about whether ETA was involved in the attack, despite plenty of evidence to the contrary.
The blasts hit three days before the last elections, which the governing centre-right Popular Party had looked set to win.
The then government's insistence that ETA planted the bombs backfired when evidence piled up to show they were the work of radical Islamists and were linked to Spain's backing of the US-led invasion of Iraq.
Days later, voters turned out en masse and brought in the Socialists, who quickly pulled Spanish troops out of Iraq.
"(The Popular Party) had better prepare themselves psychologically to accept what they have failed to accept since March 2004," Socialist party member Antonio Hernando said.
Popular Party Secretary General Angel Acebes, who was interior minister in 2004, said his party wanted "justice for the victims, for democracy, so an attack of this magnitude never happens again".
CHRONOLOGY-EVENTS SINCE MADRID TRAIN BOMBINGS
Timeline since bombings
March 11, 2004 - Ten bombs kill 191 people and wound around 1800 in simultaneous explosions in four packed rush hour trains on the Madrid railways.
March 12 - Then-Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar links Basque separatists ETA to the attacks.
March 14 - A video tape purportedly from al Qaeda says the Islamic militant group bombed the trains in retaliation for Spain's cooperation with US President Bush and his allies.
- ETA issues a statement denying any role.
- Spaniards throw out Aznar's centre-right government in a spectacular election upset. Socialist leader Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero becomes prime minister in April.
April 2 - A bomb is found on a high-speed rail track connecting Madrid and Seville.
April 3 - Serhane ben Abdelmajid Farkhet, known as The Tunisian and the suspected ringleader, blows himself up with up to six accomplices after police corner them in an apartment.
Nov. 29 - Aznar testifies to a parliamentary commission defending his decision to initially blame ETA.
Dec. 7 - Italy hands over Rabei Osman Sayed Ahmed, a prime suspect in the bombings.
March 11, 2005 - Islamic Commission of Spain issues a religious order declaring Osama bin Laden to have forsaken Islam by backing attacks such as those in Madrid.
June 22 - Parliamentary commission finds the previous government "manipulated and twisted" the bombings to try to win elections.
April 11, 2006 - Prosecuting magistrate Juan Del Olmo orders 29 people, mostly Spanish or Moroccan to stand trial. His report concludes the bombers were inspired, not directed by, al Qaeda.
Feb. 15, 2007 - Lead judge Javier Gomez Bermudez opens the trial. One of the accused is acquitted.
Oct. 31 - Judge due to give verdicts.
- REUTERS
