Image caption Rajib Karim was arrested in Newcastle in February 2010 
 
 A former British Airways worker has been convicted of four counts of preparing acts of terrorism. Rajib Karim's trial revealed new details about how Islamist extremists in the West forge links with groups overseas. 
 
 The British Airways worker was acting under orders from Anwar Al-Awlaki, described in court as a "major terrorist planner," who exerts a powerful influence on his followers, despite being on the run in Yemen. 
 
 Trial testimony also suggests Karim had developed links with sympathisers in the UK, including another man who worked at BA. 
 
 But Karim's journey to jihad began on the other side of the world, when both he and his brother Tehzeeb turned towards al-Qaeda's world view. 
 
 The brothers, who are from a wealthy family in Bangladesh, began following radical Islamist thinking over the internet and in study circles. 
 
 Along with friends who were educated at the same private school, they supported Jammat-ul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) which fought to establish an Islamic state in the country. 
 
 The group, banned in both Bangladesh and the UK, launched a violent bombing campaign in 2005 - but its leaders were arrested and later executed. 
 
 Image caption Anwar al-Awlaki's perfect grasp of English has made him attractive to Western jihadists 
 
 With the group in disarray, the brothers wanted to seek new outlets to satisfy their dream of dying as martyrs. 
 
 But Rajib Karim's ambitions were put on hold. He had travelled to the UK with his British wife to seek medical attention for their sick young son. 
 
 Meanwhile, Tehzeeb had successfully travelled to Yemen where the group al-Qaeda on the Arabian Peninsula had established a base. 
 
 He succeeded in getting an audience with Anwar Al-Awlaki, whom, in messages, the brothers referred to reverentially as "professor." 
 
 Growing support 
 
 Al-Awlaki, an American citizen of Yemeni origin, was attracting growing support from young jihadists in the West because he had one attractive feature over other radical preachers: he spoke perfect Western English. 
 
 The preacher and AQAP has been linked with a series of incidents over the past two years, including the killing of 13 people at Fort Hood in Texas and the failed attempt to bomb a plane heading to Detroit on Christmas Day 2009. 
 
 Two incidents have directly affected the UK. The woman who stabbed MP Stephen Timms in "revenge" for the Iraq War was inspired by his sermons. And, last autumn, a cargo plane bound for the US was intercepted in the UK with explosives hidden in a printer cartridge. 
 
 Mustafa Abulhimal from the Quilliam Foundation, a counter extremism think-tank, said al-Awlaki's danger came from what he has inspired others to do. 
 
 "In his relatively short career in the violent world of extremism today, he has managed to unfortunately inspire a significant number of individuals in the States and Europe. 
 
 Image caption Awlaki uses slick media productions to sell his message 
 
 "These individuals are either in direct e-mail exchange with Awlaki or are inspired by his audio tapes which, until very recently, were in the public domain and even some universities…" 
 
 "What this audience needs is some material, not necessarily a military camp or training camp in a mountainous area, they just want to be sitting at their computer and receive by the internet all the violent material." 
 
 His hardline rhetoric - delivered in online English-language sermons - spoke directly to the Karim brothers, neither of whom could understand Arabic. 
 
 Al-Awlaki sent the brothers a personal audio message confirming that he had survived a US missile attack. Rajib told Tehzeen that, "hearing the shaykh's voice filled my heart with joy." 
 
 But Rajib was torn about how best to assist the global jihad. He hated living among non-Muslims in Newcastle. Longing to fight jihad, he told his brother to "please mention me by name, that Allah grants me martyrdom at the earliest." 
 
 He was even prepared to take his pregnant wife with him to fight. "If the new baby dies or she dies while delivered... they will be counted as martyrs," he told his brother. 
 
 As the months wore on, he became increasingly maudlin. He frequently complained to his brother about his isolation and his desperation to fight and die in the holy war. "My desire is to gain martyrdom before you or with you," he said. 
 
 But Al-Awlaki had other ideas for the BA software engineer. In January 2010, he passed an "urgent message" to Karim telling him he was "excited" that they had a man on the inside of one of the world's biggest airlines. 
 
 "I pray that Allah may grant us a breakthrough through you," he said. 
 
 He told Karim to stay where he was, rather than travel to Yemen for terrorist training. Rajib, he said, might be able to provide us with critical and urgent information." 
 
 Four days later Karim replied, explaining that he had "worked very hard in painting myself as a liberal Muslim." That was a view supported by testimony at the trial from his closest BA colleagues, none of whom realised his true intentions. 
 
 Access all areas? 
 
 Karim told the preacher that he had access to BA's servers and could erase all the data, causing massive disruption and financial loss. In evidence, BA witnesses said that the airline would lose £20m a day if its IT systems collapsed - although they stressed that Karim did not have access at that time to live systems. 
 
 Karim told Al-Awlaki that managers at BA were looking for volunteers to work as cabin crew, covering for any colleagues who went on strike during the airline's 2009 industrial dispute. 
 
 He applied but was rejected because he had not been in the company long enough. Undeterred, he told Al-Awlaki: "I personally know two brothers, one who works in baggage handling at Heathrow and another who works in airport security... but I am not sure if they are at the stage to sacrifice with their lives." 
 
 The baggage handler was later arrested - but was released without charge and is currently reported to be appealing against losing his job. 
 
 In his last message to Karim, Al-Awlaki identified his objectives: "Our highest priority is the US. Anything there, even on a smaller scale compared to what we may do in the UK, would be our choice. 
 
 "With the people you have is it possible to get a package or a person with a package on board a flight heading to the US?" 
 
 Karim replied, in a message that sealed his fate: "I can work with the bros to find out the possibilities of shipping a package to a US-bound plane." 
 
 Ten days later British counter-terrorism police officers arrested Karim at his desk at work. 
 
 During his evidence, Karim appeared articulate and intelligent, arguing that he wanted to use Al-Awlaki to get access to the jihad in Yemen, rather than to launch attacks on the West. But the evidence told its own tale. 
 
 It took detectives nine months to fully decrypt Karim's secret messages to Awlaki and his brother - the most complex code-breaking work ever undertaken by counter-terrorism officers. 
 
 Their success in deciphering his coded heart-to-heart chats with his brother provided the police with the evidence used to devastating effect in this trial. He now faces a life sentence. ||||| A jury convicted a former British Airways computer specialist on Monday of plotting with U.S.-born extremist cleric Anwar al-Awlaki to blow up an airplane in an attack intended to kill hundreds of people. 
 
 This undated photo released by the British Metropolitan Police shows Rajib Karim who was found guilty Monday Feb. 28, 2011 at Woolwich Crown Court in London of plotting to blow up a plane while working... (Associated Press) 
 
 Rajib Karim, a 31-year-old Bangladeshi man, was convicted of four counts of engaging in preparation for terrorist attacks. He had already pleaded guilty to five other terrorism offenses, but denied plotting an attack in Britain. 
 
 A jury deliberated for 16 hours before agreeing with prosecutors who said Karim used his position at the airline to conspire with al-Awlaki, a notorious radical preacher associated with al-Qaida and thought to be hiding in Yemen. At one point, encouraged by al-Awlaki, he applied for training as a flight attendant. 
 
 Colin Gibbs, a counterterrorism lawyer for the Crown Prosecution Service, said Karim "was plotting with the cleric to use his job at BA to kill hundreds of innocent people." 
 
 "The most chilling element of this case is probably the fact that Karim tried to enroll as cabin crew and anyone can imagine how horrific the consequences of this could have been, had he succeeded," Gibbs said. 
 
 Prosecutor Jonathan Laidlaw told the court that Karim "sought work in this country of the sort which would be useful to him or a terrorist organization in planning an attack _ an attack of the sort which might result in the wholesale loss of life." 
 
 Prosecutors said that in heavily encrypted exchanges, Al-Awlaki quizzed Karim about details of security flaws and urged the aspiring terrorist to train as a flight attendant to assist plans to use suicide bombers or mail bombs to down U.S.-bound flights. 
 
 "Our highest priority is in the U.S.," al-Awlaki told Karim in an encrypted message, thought by police to have been sent in February 2010. "The question is, with the people you have, is it possible to get a package, or a person with a package, onboard a flight heading to the U.S?" 
 
 The cleric told Karim he hoped he would be able to supply "critical and urgent information" related to airline security because of his role at BA. He told the airline worker he "may be able to play a crucial role," in future attacks. 
 
 Karim, who was arrested at his BA desk in the northern English city of Newcastle in February 2010, was convicted after a trial at Woolwich Crown Court in London. He is due to be sentenced on March 18. 
 
 Karim, who studied electronic engineering at a university in Manchester between 1998 and 2002 and has a British wife, returned to Britain in 2006 and joined BA the following year. 
 
 He admitted helping make a video about an organization called Jamaat-Ul Mujahideen Bangladesh because he believed it had been misrepresented as a terrorist organization. 
 
 He pleaded guilty to helping produce a terrorist group's video, fundraising and volunteering for terror abroad _ but insisted he never planned an attack in Britain. 
 
 But Laidlaw said that Karim became disillusioned with Jamaat-Ul Mujahideen's reluctance to carry out attacks overseas, and applied for jobs in Britain with BA and with Balfour Beatty, a construction company involved in major infrastructure projects. 
 
 The prosecutor said that Karim spent several years at BA cultivating a low profile, presenting himself as "mild-mannered, well-educated and respectful." 
 
 All the while he was trading messages with al-Awlaki _ some through Karim's brother, who had traveled from Bangladesh to Yemen. 
 
 In one exchange, Karim expressed concern that al-Awlaki had been killed in a U.S. drone strike. It prompted the cleric to send a 30-second audio file, offering proof he was still alive. 
 
 The messages showed that Al-Awlaki probed Karim for details on how someone on a terrorist watch list, or from a country likely to be under close scrutiny by Western intelligence services might evade security measures. 
 
 He also urged Karim to exploit a strike by BA cabin crew, during which managers asked other staff to train for cabin duties. Though Karim put himself forward, he was rejected because he had not served a required five years with the airline. 
 
 Al-Awlaki is thought to have orchestrated the unsuccessful October plot to send mail bombs on planes from Yemen to the U.S., hidden in the toner cartridges of computer printers. He is also believed to have inspired or helped coordinate the failed December 2009 bombing of a Detroit-bound airliner and the 2009 shooting at a U.S. Army base in Fort Hood, Texas. 
 
 Last year, Britain's top law enforcement official cited Karim's case as proof that al-Qaida's offshoot in Yemen, al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, was attempting attacks on U.K. and U.S. 
 
 Home Secretary Theresa May told an audience of intelligence chief and security experts that the group had "shown the ability to project a threat far beyond the borders of Yemen." ||||| A disciple of the Yemen-based radical cleric Anwar al-Awlaki has been found guilty of plotting to blow up a plane while working as a computer specialist with British Airways. 
 
 Rajib Karim, 31, used his position as an IT expert with the airline to try to help stage attacks on the west. 
 
 A jury at Woolwich crown court also found Karim, 31, guilty of three additional counts of preparing for terrorist attacks, including conspiring with on-the-run radical cleric Awlaki. Karim plotted to blow up an aircraft, shared information of use to Awlaki, offered to help financial or disruptive attacks on BA and gained a UK job to exploit terrorist purposes, the jurors ruled. 
 
 Police took months to break encrypted messages on his computer. They found he had been in direct contact with Awlaki, who is accused of having links to the attempted bombing of a plane over Detroit during Christmas in 2009 and an attempt last year to explode ink printer bombs on freight planes heading to the US. 
 
 Karim, who worked for BA in Newcastle, studied electronics at Manchester University from 1998 to 2002 where he gained a 2.2. He then went back to his native Bangladesh, where he supported an extremist organisation. 
 
 He returned to the UK in 2006, purportedly to seek medical treatment for his young son, who was wrongly thought to have cancer. But police believe Karim had committed himself to violent jihad and sought a job where he could best help the terrorist cause. 
 
 In September 2007 he became a graduate IT trainee with BA Police described the computer encryption Karim used as the most sophisticated they had seen in a British terrorist case. It took nine months to crack the secrets of his home computer, with one detective comparing the encryption to "Russian dolls", where one layer was cracked only to reveal another. 
 
 The trial at Woolwich crown court, south-east London, heard Awlaki had written an email to Karim asking: "Is it possible to get a package or person with a package on board a flight heading to the US?" 
 
 Police believe Karim was offering to supply information to terrorists that could be used to stage an attack. He also tried to join BA cabin crew during a strike but failed because of a technicality. 
 
 Karim shared details of his BA contacts in encrypted emails, claiming to know of a sympathetic security guard and baggage handler. 
 
 Jonathan Laidlaw QC, prosecuting, said of Karim: "He is ... an Islamic extremist, with close association to, if not membership of Jamaat ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh, an organisation committed to the establishment of Islamic rule in Bangladesh, responsible for terrorist attacks in Bangladesh, and with links to al-Qaida. The defendant ... believes terrorism, including murder of civilians, is permissible to establish, as he views it, a true Islamic state. [He] was anxious himself to carry out such an attack and determined to seek martyrdom." 
 
 Karim had denied plotting to blow up a plane and gaining a job in the UK for terrorist purposes, but pleaded guilty to fundraising for terrorist organisations. 
 
 He may have been planning to crash BA's sophisticated computer systems causing chaos and huge financial losses, the court heard. 
 
 In one email Karim wrote: "'From the moment I entered this country my niyah [purpose] was to do something for the deen [faith], it was not to make a living here and start enjoying life." 
 
 In February last year Awlaki wrote to Karim: "Our highest priority is the US. Anything there, even on a smaller scale compared to what we may do in the UK would be our choice. So the question is with the people you have is it possible to get a package or a person with a package on board a flight heading to the US?" 
 
 A few days later Karim replied: "I do not know much about US I can work with the bros to find out the possibilities of shipping a package to a US-bound plane." 
 
 The case highlighted the power of Awlaki to recruit people for jihad via the internet. 
 
 Roshonara Choudhry, a student from London, was convicted last year of trying to murder the Labour MP Stephen Timms after watching Awlaki's sermons online, including on sites such as YouTube.
– A British Airways IT specialist has been convicted of plotting to blow up a plane, along with three additional counts of terrorist planning—including conspiring with Yemen-based radical Anwar al-Awlaki and passing him useful information. It took police nine months to crack encrypted messages on Rajib Karim’s home computer; investigators called them the most complex yet seen in British terror, the Guardian reports. Born in Bangladesh, Karim and his brother had supported a banned radical group, the BBC notes. Karim, who studied at Manchester University, returned to England in 2006 and took a job at BA in 2007; police believe he was looking for a position where he could contribute to the terrorist cause. A message from Awlaki—whom Karim called "professor"—asked if it was “possible to get a package or person with a package on board a flight heading to the US,” noting that a US attack was “our highest priority.” Click for more on Rajib Karim.