NEW YORK: A Pakistan native who was trained as a scientist in the US and suspected of being an al-Qaida operative has promised to boycott her January trial in New York.

Aafia Siddiqui interrupted lawyers to announce in federal court in Manhattan on Thursday that she did not plan to participate in her trial.

Then, during a break, she told US marshals she did not want to return to the courtroom when they led her out as she continued talking.

Siddiqui faces charges after US authorities said she grabbed a gun and fired it at a police station in Afghanistan in July 2008. She was wounded in the struggle with American soldiers.

Siddiqui studied at MIT and Brandeis University before fleeing to her native Pakistan in 2003.— AP