NY man pleads guilty in bomb plot

NEW YORK (AP) - A New York man said Friday that a plan to attack the city subway system was ordered by al-Qaida leaders two years ago while he was in Pakistan with a friend, a former airport shuttle driver who has admitted to building the homemade explosives in the plot.

Zarein Ahmedzay, 25, pleaded guilty in federal court in Brooklyn to charges including conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction in the foiled New York City subway bomb plot from fall 2009.

He said he, admitted plotter Najibullah Zazi and a third man, previously identified by the government as Adis Medunjanin, met with the leaders in Pakistan in the summer of 2008, where they offered to join the Taliban and fight U.S. forces in Afghanistan.

"They told us we would be more useful if we returned to New York City ... to conduct operations," he said. Asked by the judge what kind of operations, he responded, "Suicide-bombing operations."