Failed bomb attacks on London's transit system in July 2005 were a hoax intended to protest Britain's involvement in the Iraq war, a suspect claimed in transcripts of a police interview read out in the trial. Explosives containing a mixture of flour and acid were made the day before the attacks on July 21, 2005, and were supposed to cause fear but not injuries, suspect Hussain Osman told Italian investigators. He fled London after the failed attacks and was arrested in Rome on July 29, 2005. Osman, 28, is one of six men accused of conspiring to bomb subway trains and a bus, two weeks after four suicide bombers killed themselves and 52 commuters in London. No one was injured in the July 21 attacks.Osman; Muktar Said Ibrahim, 29; Adel Yahya, 24; Manfu Asiedu, 33; Yassin Omar, 26; and Ramzi Mohamed, 25 all deny charges of conspiracy to murder and conspiracy to cause explosions. The court was told Omar gave his interview in Italian. Born in Ethiopia, he spent five years in Italy before moving to Britain in 1996. "We made some false, fake explosives to frighten people, to stop them, because of the (Iraq) war basically," he said, in translated transcripts read out to jurors at Woolwich Crown Court. "There was a plastic (tub) and inside there was a type of flour and liquid mixed together to make it seem like explosive. It wasn't real," Osman added, describing the contents of rucksacks that he and some of the other accused carried on to the transit system.
Osman said Ibrahim and Omar had come with the idea, as they discussed the Iraq war and injustices against Muslims. "They had the idea. I said if this (hoax) could change things, I would do it," he said. When asked what things, he replied: "Change the war, the violence."