Farhad Salah jailed over remote-controlled vehicle bomb plot after five week re-trial at Sheffield Crown Court

Court artist sketch by Elizabeth Cook of Farhad Salah Credit: Elizabeth Cook/PA Archive/PA Images

An Iraqi-Kurd man who plotted a terror attack involving the use of a bomb inside a remotely-controlled vehicle has been jailed for 15 years.

Farhad Salah was described by counter-terrorism police as posing a "very real risk to the safety of the public in the UK", with prosecutors saying he had hoped to harm "others he considered to be infidels".

Over the course of a five-week re-trial at Sheffield Crown Court, jurors heard how the 24-year-old, described as being a supporter of Islamic State, had been in the early stages of testing small improvised explosive devices in preparation for an attack when he was arrested.

Counter Terrorism Policing North East of Farhad Salah, 24, who has been jailed at Sheffield Crown Court for 15 years Credit: Counter Terrorism Policing North East/PA Wire

Describing the extent of Salah's plotting to jurors, prosecutor Anne Whyte QC said during the trial: "The intention was to manufacture a device which would be placed in a vehicle but controlled remotely so that no-one had to martyr themselves in the process.

"Farhad Salah had decided that improvised explosive devices could be made and used in a way here in the UK that spared his own life preferably but harmed others he considered to be infidels."

She said that a week before being detained, the defendant had messaged a Facebook contact to say: "My only attempt is to find a way to carry out martyrdom operation with cars without driver, everything is perfect only the programme is left ..."

Ms Whyte said that Salah was getting "increasingly desperate" to do something for Islamic State at the time of his plotting but had been unable to travel to the Middle East due to his unsettled immigration status, with his application for asylum in the UK still being determined at the time of his arrest in December 2017.

Earlier this month, jurors found Salah guilty of preparing to commit acts of terrorism, and on Wednesday, Judge Paul Watson QC sentenced him to 18 years, comprising a 15-year jail term with an extended three-year period on licence.