AlQa'dah 23, 1432, Oct 21, 2011, SPA -- A Lithuanian court on Friday sentenced Irish citizen Michael Campbell to 12 years in jail for seeking to acquire weapons and explosives in Lithuania to arm a Northern Irish republican militant group after a sting operation three years ago, according to Reuters. Campbell, 38, was arrested in the Baltic state after an operation involving Lithuanian, Irish and British secret services in January 2008. "He was given sentences according to three articles of the criminal code, for a total 12-year term," Judge Arunas Kisielius told Reuters. He said both Campbell and the prosecution had the right to appeal against the sentence, delivered in a first instance court. Lithuanian prosecutors had asked the court to sentence Cambell to 16 years in jail, including his pre-trial detention, on charges of arms smuggling and aiding a "terrorist organization." The prosecutor said Campbell has paid undercover agents 10,000 euros ($13,700) to buy weapons, including a sniper rifle, detonators, timers and high explosives, which could have been used against government targets in Britain. Campbell told the court he had traveled to Lithuania to buy weapons, but said they were meant to be sold to criminals, not the Real Irish Republican Army, a splinter group of the now defunct IRA. A landmark 1998 peace deal largely ended the violence in Northern Ireland and paved the way for a power-sharing government led by Sinn Fein, the political wing of the IRA, and its former enemies in the pro-British unionist community. The Real IRA, which opposed the peace deal, was suspected of being behind the Omagh bombing the same year that killed 29 people. Campbell has denied he was acting on the orders of his brother, Liam Campbell, a member of the Real IRA, who was found responsible in a civil trial, of involvement in the Omagh bombing. Lithuanian prosecutors have said they were seeking the extradition of Liam Cambpell, now in detention in Northern Ireland, to Lithuania in relation to the arms smuggling case. The Real IRA killed two British soldiers in 2009, the deadliest act of violence in the province for more than a decade. Michael Campbell's defence lawyer, Ingrida Botyriene, told the court her client was a victim of provocation by Lithuanian and British special services. The charges were based on testimony of secret witnesses, with most of the hearings taking place behind the closed doors.
