FBI reassessing its own conduct after army shooting incident

Washington: Nearly a year before Major Nidal Hassan allegedly went on a shooting rampage at the Fort Hood army post in Texas, terrorism investigators conducted an "assessment" of him before deciding he did not pose a threat.

After the shooting, the FBI is doing a new assessment — of its own conduct.

The Army psychiatrist is believed to have acted alone despite repeated communications — intercepted by authorities — with a radical imam overseas, US officials said on Monday. The FBI will conduct an internal review to see whether it mishandled early information about the man accused in the bloody rampage that killed 13 people and wounded 29.

President Barack Obama was joining grieving families and comrades of the victims yesterday at a memorial service at the sprawling Texas base. Hassan, awake and talking to doctors, met his lawyer on Monday in the San Antonio hospital where he is recovering, under guard, from gunshot wounds in the assault.

In Washington, an investigative official and a Republican lawmaker said Hassan had communicated 10 to 20 times with Anwar Al Awlaki, an imam released from a Yemeni jail last year who has used his personal website to encourage Muslims across the world to kill US troops in Iraq. Despite that, no formal investigation was opened into Hassan, they said.

Investigative officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to discuss the case. Republican Representative Pete Hoekstra of Michigan, the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, said it was his understanding Hassan and the imam exchanged e-mails that counter terrorism officials picked up.

Officials said Hassan will be tried in a military court, not a civilian one, a choice that suggests his alleged actions are not thought to have emanated from a terrorist organisation.

FBI Director Robert Mueller ordered the inquiry into the bureau's handling of the case.

Vow to examine motive

President Barack Obama and investigators pledged on Monday to learn the motive behind last week's mass shooting at a US military base now its chief suspect has awakened in hospital and was able to talk.

"I think the questions that we're asking now ... is, ‘Is this an individual who's acting in this way or is it some larger set of actors?'" Obama said in a television interview on the eve of his visit to Fort Hood, in Texas.

"I'll be heading to there tomorrow so that I can personally express the incredible heartbreak that we al l feel for — for the loss of these young men and women," Obama said of the shooting death.