HUGE MOROCCAN TERROR TRIAL STARTS !

Huge Moroccan terror trial starts
By Richard Hamilton BBC News, Rabat.

Authorities in Morocco are on high alert after recent suicide bombings. One of Morocco's biggest terror trials has started in the city of Sale.
Fifty defendants belonging to a group called Ansar al-Mehdi are accused of plotting attacks on politicians, diplomats and tourists.
The trial has been adjourned three times over several months. The defendants deny the charges.
The prosecution says the plot, if carried out, would have eclipsed the 2003 suicide bombings in Casablanca, in which 45 people died.
High alert
The judge read out the charges separately to each of the 50 defendants.
He said they were accused of participating in a terrorist plot, being members of an illegal organisation and holding an unauthorised meeting.
The security services have alleged that Ansar al-Mehdi was planning to kidnap Moroccan government ministers, attack the United States embassy in Rabat and target tourists.
The wives of two pilots with the national airline Royal Air Maroc are among the accused, some of whom have alleged they were tortured.
The authorities in Morocco are on high alert after five suicide bombers blew themselves up in Casablanca last month.

BBC NEWS REPORT.