'Martyr emails of shoebomber'

Shoe bomber Richard Reid left emails confessing to trying to blow up a Paris to Miami flight at Christmas, French police have revealed.

Notes from the Briton, 28, have been discovered on the hard drive of a computer in a Paris cyber caf?, investigators said. In emails sent to addresses all over Europe, Reid allegedly claimed to be a "martyr for the Islamic cause".

He is said to have written the notes in the days before he boarded the flight on 22 December at Paris's Charles de Gaulle, with explosives packed into his trainers. He was overpowered by passengers and the American Airlines flight diverted to Boston, where he was arrested.

The notes came to light after the FBI agents holding Reid found a business card from the cyber caf? in his belongings. French police raided the caf?, seizing computer hard drives. In one email to a person in Pakistan, Reid allegedly explained how he had been turned back as he tried to board a flight in Paris on 21 December, and that it appeared too difficult to continue.

But his correspondent reportedly urged him to keep trying.