Three Norway-based al Qaeda henchmen were busted yesterday for their roles in a murderous conspiracy linked to foiled bomb plots that targeted the New York City subway system and a shopping mall in Britain, authorities announced yesterday.

The Oslo cell members ominously shared the same al Qaeda mastermind and mission to detonate powerful bombs as their co-conspirators in New York and Manchester, England, US and European authorities said.

The raids -- carried out simultaneously in Oslo and Frankfurt, Germany -- came after media got wind of the yearlong investigation into the cell, according to Janne Kristiansen, the head of Norway's Police Security Service.

The sweep also came a day after US officials said last year's plot by three Queens ex-classmates to attack the New York subway was directly related to an April 2009 planned assault in Manchester.

"The FBI worked closely with our law-enforcement partners in England and Norway throughout the investigation," said FBI spokesman Richard Kolko.

Counterterrorism investigators believe all three fiendish schemes were conceived by Saleh al-Somalia, the former al Qaeda "chief of external operations" in charge of planning attacks.

A CIA drone missile killed al-Somalia in Pakistan last December, but his plots were already under way, authorities said.

The Manchester and New York plotters were also in contact with his successor, Adnan el Shukrijumah, an ex-Brooklynite now believed to be in Afghanistan, according to court documents.

The feds have a $5 million bounty on Shukrijumah's head.

Snared yesterday was a 39-year-old Uighur with Norwegian citizenship. Uighurs are a Muslim minority living in China's restive Xinjiang province.

Queens plotter Najibullah Zazi was in the lawless Waziristan region of Pakistan the same time as the Uighur, a US official said.

Oslo police also nabbed a 31-year-old Uzbekistan national with Norwegian residency.

The third co-conspirator, described as a 37-year-old Iraqi with Norwegian permanent residency, was picked up in Frankfurt.

The Norway cell members might have been unaware of their connection to the Manchester and New York plots and it's unknown if they perfected the art of manufacturing the peroxide bombs.

It's also unclear if their plan involved attacks in Norway or elsewhere, but al Qaeda's No. 2 leader, Ayman al-Zawahiri, has called for attacks against the Scandinavian state for its backing of US troops in Afghanistan.

Meanwhile, in Brooklyn federal court, there was testimony that the bumbling JFK bomber wannabes kept blowing deals to fund their alleged plot with crazy antics. For example, former airport cargo worker Russell Defreitas flew to his native Guyana to show a poorly shot video of the targeted fuel tanks at JFK, informant Steven Francis said.

Talib Bilal Rutherford, a powerful mine owner in Georgetown, allegedly offered to supply money and dynamite.

But Defreitas became suspicious that Rutherford was going to cut him out of the plot, Francis said.

When Defreitas snatched back his amateur video, Rutherford kicked him out, the mole said.

 

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