Gulf | Saudi Arabia
Saudis ground airborne terror plot by Al Qaida
Saudi Arabia said it had arrested 172 terror suspects, along with wea-pons and wads of cash, with some of the militants plotting airborne attacks on oil facilities and army bases.
- Agencies
- Published: 00:00 April 28, 2007
- Saudi police stand guard outside the Grand Mosque in Makkah on February 7, 2007. Police have arrested 172 Islamic militants, some of whom were being trained as pilots so they could fly aircraft in attacks on Saudi oil fields.
- Image Credit: AP
Riyadh: Saudi Arabia on Friday said it had arrested 172 terror suspects, along with wea-pons and wads of cash, with some of the militants plotting airborne attacks on oil facilities and army bases.
"Some individuals were training to fly to carry out terrorist attacks ... Some of the cells arrested planned to target oil installations and refineries," said Interior Ministry spokesman General Mansour Al Turki.
The Al Qaida suspects rounded up by security forces, including Saudis and foreign residents, belonged to seven cells, the ministry said in a statement which did not disclose the foreigners' nationalities.
"One of their main targets was to carry out suicide attacks against public figures and oil installations and to target military bases inside and outside [the country]," it added. Al Turki said their targets included "military bases in and outside" Saudi Arabia.
Arms haul in desert
The arrests reported were one of the largest swoops announced by Saudi Arabia, which has been battling suspected Al Qaida militants since they launched a wave of shootings and bombings in 2003.
"They had reached an advanced stage of readiness and what remained only was to set the zero hour for their attacks," Al Turki said.
"They had the personnel, the money, the arms. Almost all the elements for terror attacks were complete except for setting the zero hour for the attacks."
Asked about when the arrests took place, Al Turki would only say they occurred "at various and successive times."
An interior ministry statement said various weapons and communications equipment were seized in the swoop, in addition to money totalling more than 20 million riyals (about Dh20 million).
The Saudi channel Al Ekhbariah broadcast footage of a large cache of weapons discovered in the desert. The arms included AK-47 rifles and other rifles, brickettes of plastic explosives, AK-47 magazines, handguns and rifles wrapped in plastic sheeting. The channel also showed investigators digging up plastic sacks.
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