MONDAY, JULY 21, 2003
Chinese court sentences Osama imposter
PTI
BEIJING: A court in east China's Jiangxi province has given an 18- month sentence to a man who claimed to be terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden and threatened to blow up a key railway line to Hong Kong, state media reported on Sunday.
The court convicted Li Dade of making terror phone calls claiming that he was "a cloned bin Laden" and was going to blow up the Beijing-Kowloon railway, Xinhua news agency reported from the provincial capital, Nanchang.
According to court sources, Li, a self-employed decorator in Ji'an city of Jiangxi, became very distraught after losing money in the stock market.
On March 13 of this year, Li called the "114" information service number in Beijing three times, threatening to blow up the railway.
Railway police departments in Beijing and Nanchang immediately sent anti-terror special squads to search for the explosive device which Li had claimed to have planted along the railway.
The police later succeeded in tracking the man via mobile phone system and captured him in Ji'an on March 14.
The Nanchang railway transport court tried Li, who was sentenced in accordance with the criminal law on July 17, the report said.
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