Convicted Air India bomber Reyat to go on trial for perjury

VANCOUVER (CP) - Convicted Air India bomb-maker Inderjit Singh Reyat will go to trial next May on perjury charges. Lawyers appeared in B.C. Supreme Court to set the date although they will return next month to confirm it before Associate Chief Justice Patrick Dohm.

Reyat was charged with perjury after his testimony in the trial of two men co-accused in the Air India case.

Ripudaman Singh Malik and Ajaib Singh Bagri were acquitted in March 2005 of murder and conspiracy charges in the 1985 bombing of Air India Flight 182 that killed 329 people.

The indictment filed against Reyat in B.C. Supreme Court lists 27 times where he allegedly misled the court during his testimony in September 2003.

Reyat is currently serving a five-year sentence for manslaughter as part of a plea agreement for the deaths of those killed after the bomb exploded aboard the plane on June 23, 1985.

He could spend a maximum of 14 years in prison if convicted of perjury.

Before that, Reyat served 10 years for a blast at Tokyo's Narita airport the same day as Flight 182.

© The Canadian Press, 2006