Moussaoui says he now renounces terrorism, bin Laden

Zacarias Moussaoui, who was sentenced to life in prison in connection with the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, said he renounces both terrorism and the late Osama bin Laden.

“I denounce, repudiate Usama bin Laden as a useful idiot of the CIA/Saudi,” Moussaoui wrote in a handwritten court motion he filed with a federal court in Alexandria, Va., last month, according to The Associated Press. “I also proclaim unequivocally my opposition to any terrorist action, attack, propaganda against the U.S.”

He added he wants “to warn young Muslim against the deception and the manipulation of these fake Jihadis.”

The French citizen struck a much more defiant note at his 2006 trial, where he was spared the death penalty by a single juror. At his final sentencing hearing, Moussaoui told the judge “God save Osama bin Laden, you will never get him.” The al Qaeda leader was killed by U.S. forces five years later.

Moussaoui is frequently been referred to as the “20th hijacker,” but in his trial prosecutors argued not that he had intended to participate in the attacks but that he lied to the FBI about his knowledge of the plot after his August 2001 arrest on charges of immigration violations.

He made the motion as part of a petition for some of the special administrative measures he serves under to be relaxed. Moussaoui, who represented himself leading up to his trial, has asked for either Alan Dershowitz or Rudy Giuliani to represent him and asked to testify in a civil suit filed by victims of the attacks, according to the AP.

While Moussaoui has frequently sought to testify in the civil trial before, the latest motion marks the first time he has renounced terrorism or bin Laden.

District Judge Leonie Brinkema, who presided over the trial, denied the motion and told Moussaoui to file any grievance relating to the conditions of his incarceration in Colorado, where he is serving a life sentence. Moussaoui has appealed the denial to the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, according to the AP.