French 'Big Bang' scientist on trial for alleged terror plot

A Franco-Algerian nuclear physicist went on trial Thursday for allegedly plotting terror attacks in France, where an Islamist's killing spree has already overshadowed the presidential campaign. A week after police shot dead Franco-Algerian Mohamed Merah for killing seven people in and around Toulouse, Adlene Hicheur stood trial charged with criminal association as part of a terrorist enterprise. French police arrested Hicheur, a researcher studying the universe's birth -- the Big Bang -- at the European Organisation for Nuclear Research (CERN), in October 2009 after intercepting emails he wrote. The trial began Thursday afternoon in a Paris courtroom and was to last two days, with the court to examine 35 emails between Hicheur and an alleged Al-Qaeda contact. At the start of the trial, Hicheur, 35, denounced the case against him. "I see a lot of confusion and inaccuracies," he told the court. "It would be too tedious to revisit each of them (but) the assertions about me... are inaccurate, are subject to debate." After more than two years in preliminary detention, Hicheur appeared visibly tired and thin during his court appearance. His father and brothers were in court to support him. Following Hicheur's arrest at his parents' home near CERN, which lies on the Franco-Swiss border northwest of Geneva, police discovered a trove of Al-Qaeda and Islamist militant literature. France's DCRI domestic intelligence agency's suspicions were raised following a statement from Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) that was sent to President Nicolas Sarkozy's Elysee Palace in early 2008. Police carried out surveillance on several email accounts including Hicheur's and his exchanges with Mustapha Debchi, an alleged AQIM representative living in Algeria. In the emails Hicheur proposed "possible objectives in Europe and particularly in France", mentioning for example a French military base at Cran-Gevrier, close to CERN. Asked by Debchi if he was "prepared to work in a unit becoming active in France," Hicheur replied: "The answer is of course YES". Magistrates investigating the case said the exchanges "crossed the line of simple debate of political or religious ideas to enter the sphere of terrorist violence." They say the accused "knowingly agreed with Mustapha Debchi to set up an operational cell ready to carry out terrorist acts in Europe and in France." The defence is contesting the identity of the alleged Al-Qaeda agent and Hicheur told the court police had selectively taken documents from his home. Investigators "left behind 99 percent of the literature at my home, it's dishonest, it's even disgusting," he said. He also said that police had carried out "dirty work" while translating documents in the case. Since he was arrested, Hicheur has said he never agreed to "anything concrete". "There is not the least proof of a beginning of a (terrorist) intention," said Hicheur's lawyer, Patrick Baudouin, before the trial. The lawyer slammed what he called "the steamroller of anti-terrorist justice". "He has since the beginning been painted as the ideal guilty party," Baudouin said. "When the justice system gets going it finds it difficult to admit its mistakes." If found guilty, Hicheur could be sentenced to 10 years in prison.