The Federal High Court in Abuja has granted an application filed by the Department of State Services (DSS) to expedite proceedings in the trial of the suspected mastermind of the August 26, 2011 bombing of the United Nations building in Abuja, Khalid Al-Barnawi and four others.
Through its counsel, Alex Iziyon, the DSS had moved the application for accelerated hearing on the ground that the service is prepared to ensure that the case is determined in a timely manner.
In the application, which was not opposed by counsels to the defendants, parties will be allowed to watch video recordings presented by the DSS to prove that the extrajudicial statements made by the defendants was done voluntarily as against the claim of some of the defendants.
Justice Nwite then adjourned the matter until October 23 and October 24 for continuation of the trial-within-trial.
Al-Barnawi is being prosecuted on terrorism related charges along with other suspected members of his group
Other co-defendants include Mohammed Bashir Saleh; Umar Mohammed Bello, a.k.a Datti; Mohammed Salisu and Yakubu Nuhu, a.k.a Bello Maishayi.
They, are among others, accused of being members of the Ansaru terrorist group, also known as Jama’atu Ansarul Muslimina Fi Biladis Sudan.
The defendants are also alleged to have conspired among themselves to carry out acts of terrorism between 2011 and 2013 in Sokoto, Kebbi, Bauchi, Borno, Gombe, and other states in the northern part of the country.
He was reported to have claimed that it carried out an attack on a maximum security prison in Abuja in 2012 during which dozens of inmates were freed
The secret service had, in April 2016, arrested Al-Barnawi in Lokoja in Kogi, five years after the attack on the Abuja UN Building.
Earlier, United States placed a $5 million (£3.5m) bounty on Al-Barnawi’s head after branding him one of three Nigerian “specially designated global terrorists.”
The attack, the first of such in Nigeria on an international organisation, left over 20 persons dead and over 70 others injured.
However, several legal and administrative issues had stalled Al-Barnawi’s trial, which began shortly after his arrest in 2016.
Ansaru is said to be ideologically aligned to al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and is also accused of killing many Westerners.