JordanÂ’s State Security court sentenced a Jordanian man to death on Monday for his role in an attack on the countryÂ’s embassy in Baghdad in 2003. Muammar al-Jaghbeer was captured in neighbouring Iraq and extradited to Jordan in 2005. The truck bombing outside the Jordanian embassy in August 2003 killed at least 17 people and wounded more than 60. The court dropped the case against the slain head of the al Qaeda wing in Iraq, Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, following his death in a US air strike in 2006. Both men had been accused of planning and participating in the suicide bombing of the embassy by delivering the vehicle that was packed with explosives and used in the attack.
The al Qaeda network led by Saudi fugitive Osama bin Laden has long considered Jordan’s rulers as collaborators with “infidel” Western powers. The authorities say they have foiled countless plots by militant fundamentalists to destabilise Jordan.