Testimony ends in US terror trial

Jose Padilla was arrested at Chicago airport in May 2002

The defence has rested its case in the trial of US citizen Jose Padilla and two other men accused of supporting terrorism and conspiring to kill.

Mr Padilla's lawyers did not call a single witness during the 53-day trial.

Evidence from the prosecution focused on recorded telephone conversations involving his co-defendants Adham Amin Hassoun and Kifah Wael Jayyousi.

All three men face life sentences if convicted of providing support for Islamic extremists overseas.

It is alleged they conspired to murder, kidnap and maim people in Afghanistan, Chechnya, Bosnia and other countries from 1993 to 2001.

The case is expected to go to the jury next week.

The telephone conversations presented as evidence were mostly in Arabic and prosecution witnesses said they contained coded references to terrorist activity.

Mr Padilla was heard on only seven of the tapes and he did not use any coded language, the FBI's lead investigator testified.

Al-Qaeda training camp

The chief evidence against him is an application form to attend an al-Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan which prosecutors say prove he was connected to Islamic extremists.

Mr Padilla, a former Chicago gang member of Puerto Rican descent, is a convert to Islam.

He was arrested at Chicago's O'Hare Airport in May 2002 after returning from Pakistan.

After his arrest Mr Padilla was accused of planning to detonate a radioactive bomb and held in a military jail without charge for three years.

But when he was transferred to the civilian courts in 2005 the indictment made no mention of the so-called dirty bomb plot.

Mr Padilla says he was tortured whilst in military detention. US officials deny that he was abused.