North Yorkshire arms dealer Peter Bleach and five Latvians were sentenced to life imprisonment today for smuggling arms intended for Indian revolutionaries.

Bleach and the Latvian crewmen who parachuted crates of weapons into eastern India five years ago have said they will appeal to a higher court against their convictions.

Outside the courtroom, Bleach, 48, formerly of Fylingthorpe, near Whitby, said: "I am very disappointed, but not surprised."

The former pupil of St Peter's School, York, avoided a possible death sentence after being cleared of waging war against the Indian government. But he and the Latvians were convicted of aiding insurgents.

Bleach, a former lance corporal in the Army Intelligence Corps, has already spent four years in jail in Calcutta since his arrest.

The prosecution claimed assault rifles, rocket launchers, grenades and missiles were dropped into West Bengal for a religious group opposed to that state's communist government.

Bleach insisted he had secretly kept the British intelligence services informed of the plan.

But he and the Latvian crewmen - Alexandre Klinchine, Oleg Gaidach, Igor Timmerman, Eugueni Antimanko and Igor Noskvitin - were finally pronounced guilty last Monday.

Bleach's ex-girlfriend Joanna Fletcher, 41, who lives in London, said she was "shocked and appalled" by the sentence. She said: "I thought Peter would get 10 years. Life seems horrendous.

"In some ways it's academic because Peter is appealing anyway. Nonetheless, it's an absolutely devastating blow - it sounds so final."

She said she would contact the relevant authorities to start work on getting him home to serve his sentence here, as India was a signatory to the exchange prisoner programme.

But Ms Fletcher said: "I have a horrible feeling that this is going to take years and be a real uphill struggle. We're not looking at Peter coming home any time soon, unfortunately."

Bleach's mother Oceana, who lives at Brompton-by-Sawdon, near Scarborough, was not available for comment today as she was said by a family friend to be very upset.

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