Plotters planned UK attack "bigger than 7/7"

LONDON (REUTERS) - Three British men planned to carry out suicide bombings which could have been more devastating than the July 7, 2005 attacks in London, a court heard on Monday.

Fifty-one people died and over 700 were injured in co-ordinated suicide bombings on London underground trains and a bus by four British Islamists in the so-called 7/7 attacks.

Irfan Naseer, 31, Irfan Khalid and Ashik Ali, both 27, are accused of being central figures in the plot, jurors at Woolwich Crown Court were told.

"The police successfully disrupted a plan to commit an act or acts of terrorism on a scale potentially greater than the London bombings in July 2005 had it been allowed to run its course," said prosecutor Brian Altman.