Bomb plot conspiracy charges filed in U.S.

An Afghanistan-born Colorado man has been charged with conspiring to explode bombs in the United States, according to an indictment unsealed Thursday in New York Federal Court.

A grand jury charged Najibullah Zazi with plotting with conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction.

Zazi was to appear in court in Denver Thursday on the charge of lying to authorities. Authorities said they plan to transfer him to the Federal Court in Brooklyn, where the new charges were filed.

Federal authorities claim Zazi played a direct role in the alleged bomb plot, although they have said they don't know the timing or location of any planned attack.

Zazi, a Colorado airport shuttle driver, admitted receiving weapons training from al-Qaeda, according to federal prosecutors.

Investigators said they found notes on bomb-making that appear to match Zazi's handwriting and discovered his fingerprints on materials — batteries and a scale — that could be used to make explosives.

Zazi told the FBI that he must have unintentionally downloaded the notes as part of a religious book and that he deleted the book "after realizing that its contents discussed jihad."

Zazi was one of three men charged over the weekend with lying to authorities in a continuing terror investigation. The other two men are Mohammed Wali Zazi, Najibullah's father, and Ahmad Wais Afzali, an imam at a mosque in Queens.