An Afghan court sentenced to death three Afghans convicted...

An Afghan court sentenced to death three Afghans convicted of killing 11 Chinese road engineers in the north-eastern province of Kunduz in June 2004, Supreme Court Judge Abdul Bari Bakhtyari said. Eight accomplices were given prison terms of up to 15 years when the case concluded.
The ringleader, General Mohammad Akbar, had been a commander in Kunduz for the Northern Alliance, a coalition of militias that helped the United States to topple the Taliban in late 2001 after it refused to hand over al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden following the September 11, 2001, attacks on US cities.
The other two men sentenced to death with the former commander were identified as Noor Mohammad and Mohammad Asif.
"Noor Mohammad has pleaded guilty while the other two pleaded innocent," the judge said. "But we have enough evidence against the other two, including confessions from Noor Mohammad and from the father of General Akbar."
Those convicted could appeal and if the appeal was rejected only intervention by President Hamid Karzai would be able to overturn the death sentence, Bakhtyari said.
While Akbar had been with the Northern Alliance he had also had contact with remnants of the Taliban, he said.
The engineers worked for a Chinese corporation on a road reconstruction project in Kunduz. The shooting as they slept in their tents was the bloodiest single act against foreigners in Afghanistan since the fall of the Taliban.