Who is Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of 9/11 attacks who'll avoid death penalty?

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the 9/11 terror attacks of 2001, has agreed to a plea deal that would see him avoid the death penalty in lieu of a life sentence, according to reports citing US prosecutors. Sheikh, usually called KSM, reached the plea deal along with two other convicts, Walid bin Attash and Mustafa al-Hawsawi, while awaiting trial for the terror strikes that killed nearly 3,000 Americans on September 11, 2001in New York, the Pentagon and in Pennsylvania.

Who is Khalid Shaikh Mohammed?

Khalid Shaikh Mohammed is a Kuwaiti mechanical engineer of Pakistani origin and self-avowed jihadist, who lived and worked in a host of countries including Qatar, the US, the Philippines, Afghanistan and Sudan.

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He wasan aide of slain al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and at one point headed the propaganda wing of the terror organisation.

Khaled Shaikh Mohammad's involvement in 9/11 terror attacks

Sheikh, also known as KSM,developedthe idea of the 9/11 attacks, and was involved in its planning as well as training of several terrorists to carry it out. The plan was to ram hijackedplanes into some of the most iconic and symbolic buildings of America: The World Trade Center, the Pentagon and possibly the White House or US Congress. Two planes hit the twin towers ofWorld Trade Center on the morning rush hour of September 11, 2001. The third plane aimed for Pentagon but went down near the periphery of the defence department headquaters. A fourth plane crashed on a field in Pennsylvania after passengers bravely fought the hijackers.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammad arrest, detention, tortureand 'confession'

Soon after the attack, a series of arrests followed, and Shaikh was one of those taken into custody from Pakistan's Rawalpindi, in a joint US-Pakistan intelligence operation. Many of the terror suspects arrested were eventually sent to Guantanamo Bay, a notorious US prison and detention camp off the Cuba coast, after being transferred to so-called 'rendition' or 'black' sites, where their years-long torture overshadowed the magnitude of the crimes they had perpetrated.

KSM, a portly man in his late 30s or early 40s at the time allegedly confessed to masterminding the attack. The 9/11 Commission Reportnamed him the "the principal architect of the 9/11 attacks".

But the confessions, allegedly made in March 2007 onwards, were done under physical torture and tough interrogations that included more than 180 rounds of so-called 'waterboarding' in KSM's case. So it is not completely credible that he also confessed to other terror plots like the Richard Reid shoe bombing, the 2002 Bali bombings in Indonesia as well as a previous bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993. He also confessed to the beheading of US Wall Streets Journal reporterDaniel Pearl.

He was also known to be involved in other terror plots, most notably the Bojinka plot in the Philippines to destroy several airlines, which eventually became his blueprint for the 9/11 attacks.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammad: A long-term jihadist

Sheikh was born on 14 April 1965in Pakistan. His family subsequently moved to Kuwait. He was radicalised as a teenager after listening to speeches of some clerics who called for jihad. He joined the Muslim Brotherhood while in his youth.

He got a mechaniacl engineering degree inthe US and went on to work in Qatar.

According to reports, he had a negative experience as an immigrant student in the US. He was jailed in the US once for not paying bills. He reportedly felt thatthe US was was "a debauched and racist" country.

At the height of Taliban resistance to the Soviet occupation of Afganistan in the 1980s, Sheikhjoined the resistance forces. KSM used to travel to key sites of jihadist groups across the world, and met Osama bin Laden in Sudan during one such trip. He later became one of his close associates. Initially he refused to join al Qaeda, but eventually becamethe head of its propaganda wing.

He drew detailed plans on how the 9/11 plot will unfold and did reconnaissance missions to the target sites. He presented the plan toOsama bin Laden some time in 1996, and then helped train and direct some of the hijackers.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammad: The Pakistan connection

Sheikh hails from Balochistan in Pakistan, where his father,Shaikh Muhammad Ali Dustin al-Baluchi, was a Deobandi imam.

It was Sheikh's presence among the plotters that pointed to Pakistan's involvement in the terror plot. Eventually, Osama bin Laden was found living in a safe house in Abbottabad, just few kilometres away from the military garrisons in Pakistani capital Islamabad. He was killed by US Marines in a night operation in May 2011.

Terrorism also runs in the family of KSM. His nephew Ramzi Yousef is a convicted terrorist for involvement inthe 1993 World Trade Center bombing. Another nephew,Ammar Al Baluchi, was involved in several terror plots.

(With inputs from agencies)