Ain-Al-Yaqeen - February 27, 2004

		February 27, 2004

THE SAUDI MINISTRY OF THE INTERIOR FOLLOWS UP THE TERRORISTS AND RENEWS ITS CALL FOR THEM TO GIVE THEMSELVES UP.
THE MINISTRY OF INTERIOR WARNS CITIZENS AND RESIDENTS OF A CAR LADEN WITH EXPLOSIVES AND EXERTS ITS UTMOST EFFORTS TO ROOT OUT TERRORISM AND PROTECT THE PEOPLE.
PRECAUTIONARY MEASURES IN THE US TO PREVENT A BIOLOGICAL OR CHEMICAL ATTACK.

The Ministry of Interior warned citizens and residents, especially in Riyadh city, of a booby trapped car loaded with a large amount of explosives to be used in a criminal act, calling for informing about this car to get the financial reward allocating for aborting these acts.

The statement issued by the Ministry said that certain information was provided on equipping and booby trapping a car registered by one wanted. The statement is accompanied by photos of a car similar to the wanted one.

The ministry identified the vehicle as a 1991 model GMC Suburban SUV, plate No. 034, burgundy color inside and leadish-gray outside. The vehicle has new tires and all the windows, except the front windscreen, are heavily tinted. There are scratches or light damage on the driver's side of the vehicle, possibly the result of a scrape with another car or solid object. All the back seats have been removed.

Some of these specifications can be changed. The car was last seen in Al-Rabwah district, East of Riyadh City.

The statement called on all to be cautious for the safety of themselves and their families, noting that this deviant group tends to conceal such dangerous explosives in residential areas.

The ministry urged the public to contact 990 if they have any information on the vehicle, adding that informants will be rewarded.

The Interior Ministry warned the residents in the capital against a possible terrorist attack. It said that a car laden with explosives registered to a wanted suspect could be used for the attack.

"We would like to notify both citizens and residents, especially in Riyadh, that we have confirmed information that a vehicle registered in the name of one of the suspects is loaded with a large quantity of explosives, which we believe are intended for use in a criminal act," the ministry said.

A reward of seven million riyals has been offered for information leading to the recovery of the car bomb that Saudi authorities believe could be used in a terror attack.

The Interior Ministry posted the reward last Friday. A statement said that they have confirmed information that a vehicle, registered in the name of one of the 26 most wanted suspects, has been equipped with a large quantity of explosives to be used in a "criminal act." The capital's residents, the ministry warned, should be on the alert as the terror suspects may well have hidden the car bomb in a residential area, urging the public to contact 990 if they have any information on the vehicle.

The government issued a list with photos of 26 wanted men on Dec. 6 last year. Authorities said the men were connected to the terrorist attacks that had taken place in the Kingdom over the past few months.

Authorities have offered a separate SR1 million reward for information leading to the arrest of any one of the wanted men on the list. The reward rises to SR5 million for information leading to the arrest of more than one, and to SR7 million for actions that foil an attempted terrorist attack.

The list includes 23 Saudis, two Moroccans and a Yemeni. The list was subsequently narrowed to 24 after one of the wanted suspects was killed in a clash with security forces and another surrendered to the authorities. A Saudi daily reported last week that the body of another suspect on the list was found in a desert area north of the capital, but the report was yet to be confirmed by authorities.

On the other hand a source at the Ministry of Interior said that since the ministry made public the description of the wanted GMC car, it has received some 2,000 calls. "Of those calls, eight of them, were precise descriptions," added the source.

The calls made by citizens are helping security forces intensify their check-ups in certain districts in the capital, mainly in the Rawdah district. The source also said that those who try to mislead security officers or help the drivers of the wanted vehicle would be severely punished. Punishments include imprisonment, severe interrogation, or a fine. The ministry also warned car workshop owners to be on the lookout for such a vehicle in an attempt for the owner of the GMC car to change its color or description.

Meanwhile, security forces have erected new security checkpoints in several areas of the city and at all entrances and exits of the capital in an effort to catch the wanted GMC car and terror suspects. There are now security checkpoints on the Riyadh-Dammam road, Riyadh-Qasim road, Riyadh-Kharj road, as well as the east ring road and the north ring road in the capital.

The ministry posted a reward of SR7 million to anyone who supplied information leading to the detention of the GMC Suburban car.

The Interior Ministry unprecedented public warning of a possible car-bomb attack by terrorists has drawn positive response from Saudis and expats alike, according to Saud Al-Musaibeeh, the Interior Ministry Director of Public Relations and Media.

No less than 2,000 phone calls on the suspect truck have been received so far and they are being processed thoroughly by our security experts, he told The Saudi Gazette.

He said the TV announcement to citizens to look out for a burgundy-colored 1991-model GMC suburban carrying a 034 license plate, was a unique and most effective advancement in the Ministry campaign to eliminate stray-minded terrorists and pre-empt their plots.

It constitutes a firm, if not unprecedented, strategy on the part of the Ministry to fully engage the public in the fight against terror cells wherever they may exist in the Kingdom, he said. The Ministry strongly sees the strategy as a religious, public and professional responsibility on its part toward the public, he added.

Al-Musaibeeh attributed public response to the SR7 million reward for anyone providing the security forces with information leading to the arrest of a terrorist suspect. The reward covers the GMC truck as well.

Even if a wanted terror suspect turns himself in and provides information leading to the capture of other terrorists or terror cells, he too will be awarded the same amount after police questioning and a possible jail sentence by the Shariah court, he said.

Al-Musaibeeh dismissed the possibility that such public warnings might cause mass panic. Quite the contrary, he said. The positive aspects of this measure overweigh the negative ones. The residents should be encouraged and even urged to shoulder their responsibilities toward this ongoing fight. We are all in the same boat. It is a collective fight.

He called on business owners throughout the Kingdom to enlighten their expatriate workers on the ongoing developments and appealed to the local media to give priority to security announcements of the fight against terrorism.

On the other hand a wanted Saudi named Majed Al-Rushoodi was arrested by security forces. The forces caught him hiding in a toilet in Buraidah, 330 kilometers (205 miles) north of Riyadh, the daily Al-Riyadh reported.

Security forces searched Rushoodi's house after cordoning off the site. The suspect, 28, had escaped from jail some time ago, the paper said. He did not put up any resistance. There were no more details about the detained man.

Security forces in the capital, meanwhile, are continuing to keep a tight vigil against terrorists in the south of the city, particularly the Al-Jazira district. Last Monday afternoon, security forces raided a villa in the district in the Iskan area to check for explosives.

Meanwhile people in the capital city went about their daily chores undisturbed by the Interior Ministry alert for an explosives-laden terrorist vehicle on the prowl.

It was last sighted in Rabwah District in Riyadh last Friday.

Security was stepped up in Rabwah District last Saturday. There were more checkpoints. Resident said police patrols and checkpoints have increased. Every main street and even by-lanes have the police patrols stationed to inspect traffic.

Rabwah District is a middle- to upper-middle-class residential area known for Al-Hukair Recreation Park and a wholesale fruits and vegetable market.

Life goes on in the district Abdullah Otaibi, a father of four, said It is the duty of every right thinking person to immediately inform the police in case the car is located, expressing pity for the young boys brainwashed by some anti-social elements and used to terrorize the people.

Shajiah, an Indian manager of Tazaj in Rabwah District, said the security checks held up business for two hours. There was heavy checking going on in front of my restaurant.

Salah Al-Romaizi, a student at King Saud University and his classmate who had come all the way from Sulai District to have their lunch in Rabwa District, were unaware of the car-bomb alert.

They were not aware of the contact number to call the police. However, in case I need to call the police I will try all the three-digit numbers, 990, 991and 993, which I know for sure belong to the security forces.

Of course the car bomb scare is worrying, but it did not stop me from going to work when I read about it in the paper. Talal Salim, a restaurant owner elsewhere in Riyadh said.

The general attitude was, however, determination to oppose terrorism and willingness to alert police if the car is spotted.

A wanted man was arrested in the Qassim region , but he is not on the government list of 26 wanted terrorists.

Security forces had kept the house of the suspect under surveillance. They sealed off the area before moving in to make the arrest. The house was searched and there was no violence in the operation.

Security bodies also surrounded a commercial location near the Iskaan district in Buraida and conducted search operations. Sources said the search was for a formerly wanted person.

Police and militants have clashed several times in the city. Last Tuesday, Saudi security forces searched a residential area of Riyadh in a hunt for terror suspects but made no arrests, a security source said.

Security forces, suspicious of suspects seeking refuge in a house in the Al-Jazirah neighborhood, were deployed to the area, the source said on condition of anonymity.

Al-Watan newspaper reported that Saudi security forces arrested a wanted man in Al-Rawdah district east of Riyadh as a massive hunt continues for terror suspects.

The Interior Ministry later said it had arrested seven people in the same district who had been planning a terrorist attack, and seized a major arms cache including explosives, rocket-propelled grenades and a bomb-laden car.

The government says in the last year it had seized 24 tons of explosives in the Kingdom as well as hundreds of explosive belts and automatic rifles.

On the other hand the Minister of Islamic Affairs, Endowments, Call and Guidance Sheikh Saleh Ibn Abdul Aziz Al- Al-Sheikh has affirmed the necessity of adopting a new methodology for Official and Non-Official Bodies, who are engaged in 'dawa' (propagation ) works of protecting Islam.

Addressing members of the Trustees Council of the World Assembly of the Muslim Youth (WAMY), He said that Islam had been harmed by some of its own followers. "Moreover, blasts and terrorism have been damaging the call for Islam and we need to be united to face this," the Minister noted.

The Saudi Minister pointed out that the nation is witnessing a grave and critical stage which requires from all Muslim Ulama, Endowments Ministers and their representatives in the whole Muslim world to be aware of the threat and the great challenges which we are facing.

He called upon Ulama to exert more efforts and work hard to activate the message of the mosque, create inside the Muslims the glory of Islam and encourage them to be proud of their religion.

Sheikh Saleh Al El Sheikh also called for achieving the meaning of the one unified nation which Almighty God order us to work for.

''In the light of this painful situation, our today cause is very big,'' the Saudi Minister said. Changes of this age have brought the Ummah face to face with a fierce campaign against its religious faith, morals and culture and its scholars, posing false accusations against Islam, and exploiting the deviation of some young Muslims, the Minister added.

Terrorist organizations have exploited the ignorance of some of the Muslim youth about the correct rules of the Islamic Shariah and turned them into willing tools to kill innocent people.

Their malice targeted this holy land and its people with no regard for God s warning against committing such heinous crimes in the holy land, the Minister said

Meantime, in Algeria it has been decided to try Hassan Hattab in absence on March 9 for setting up a terrorist group. Al Kabar newspaper said he will be tried for 21 cases related to terrorism.

Hattab is the leader of the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat. Algeria accuses the Group of planning and carrying out terrorist attacks against military and police forces. The group has also been suspected of having close relationships with Al Qaeda.

On the other hand security sources in Algeria have announced that the police forces killed five armed Islamists by bullets in clashes that took place during mopping up operations in areas where Islamists are stationed.

The sources explained that four of those five were killed in Zamouri sector to the east of Algiers during an operation which was launched in Seidi Dawoud woods which are close to the Zamouri village. The sources added that another armed Islamist was killed in Bu Tayeb mountain to the east of the capital in a similar operation.

Meantime Yemeni and U.S. coast guards last Wednesday were winding up joint military exercises in the Gulf of Aden where the destroyer USS Cole was attacked in 2000.

The weekly magazine al-Tjamoo said the exercises were designed to train Yemen's coast guard on ways to foil suicide attacks that might target tankers and warships docking in Yemeni ports.

Nearly two dozen U.S. Army experts were involved in the exercises.

Under a cooperative agreement the United States has provided the Yemen forces with seven military patrol boats and other equipment to help them patrol the 1,200 mile shoreline. A neighbor of Saudi Arabia, Yemen's shores extend from the Red Sea, through the Bab el Mandeb Strait to the Aden Gulf, a major shipping lane.

The Yemeni government says it needs at least 150 boats to be able to monitor properly the country's shoreline to keep al Qaida from infiltrating the country, which in part consists of rugged terrain similar to Afghanistan.

In Oct. 2000 a suicide attack against USS Cole in the Port of Aden killed 17 U.S. Marines. The French giant tanker, the Limburg, was attacked off Yemen's southern shores in 2002.

In Berlin Europe's five biggest states agreed a raft of proposals to step up the fight against terrorism and organized crime, including the possibility of sky marshals on board passenger planes.

The interior ministers of Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Spain agreed in principle on the use of armed marshals to deter potential hijackers.

But they would not be employed every time nor on every plane, according to French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy, speaking on behalf of G5 countries.

"We reached an agreement," he told a press conference in the winter resort of Garmish-Partenkirchen, southern Germany.

He said the police presence "will not be on every plane, or every airline, or all the time. There's no generalisation."

Sky marshals are already widely used on US passenger planes following the September 11, 2001 suicide hijackings that targeted New York and Washington.

German Interior Minister Otto Schily said he and his colleagues also agreed to accelerate the use of biometric screening data, such as iris identification and fingerprint technology, to step up airport security.

Other proposed measures include strengthening the Europe-wide police force EUROPOL and giving it responsibility for tackling counterfeit euro notes, and adopting a joint strategy on the deportation of unwanted refugees.

The ministers agreed that the use of sky marshals was not an answer on its own to a terrorist threat.

Schily said their presence could only be "one component" of a graded system of air security that also included baggage control and better checks on staff and passengers.

Sky marshals "are not a panacea," he added, while Sarkozy said they would add "an extra layer of security."

The New York Police Department, working with city health officials, the federal authorities and other agencies, has been preparing for a possible attack with nuclear, biological or chemical weapons, perhaps the most daunting threat facing municipalities in a world after the terrorist attacks here in 2001.

Meeting in secret and conducting complex drills, the department has brought together government agencies in a broad effort for much of the last year. In doing so, it has put together a program that some national security and law enforcement officials describe as unrivaled among American cities.

Police officials say that special units have trained and drilled, for instance, to board cruise ships from helicopters and piers and begun reviewing floor plans of most large Midtown theaters, conducting exercises inside some to improve their ability to respond to a possible attack, in the aftermath of the deadly siege of a Moscow theater two years ago.

In spring, city and federal officials say, the police will work alongside the city health department and other agencies to open a pilot program that they hope will ultimately allow officials to test the air across the city for biological agents quickly and constantly.

The department has also begun to prepare for its role in a sweeping citywide plan to get antibiotics or vaccine to every resident after a widespread attack with biological weapons, and it is drafting security plans for some 200 sites that could function as distribution centers.

Officials say the department has even taken to the city's streets to conduct a drill with the city's medical examiner's office to prepare for a chemical weapons attack that would litter the streets with contaminated bodies.

"We're thinking about the unthinkable - what a few years ago was the unthinkable," the police commissioner, Raymond Kelly, said in an interview, noting that the preparations were not in response to a specific or direct threat.

"It's something we're trying to take head-on, but the scope and magnitude of the problems are daunting."

Department officials said that much of the planning was still preliminary and that much remained to be done. And already, they acknowledge, they have recognized that some measures may simply be unworkable. The department, for example, has deep concerns about its ability to enforce a quarantine.

"They are trying to do what Washington is supposed to be doing, but isn't," said Richard Clarke, a former national security official under Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush.

Weeks spent with department officials and exercises in recent months in which officials brainstormed and struggled with the novel problems an attack could pose underscored the challenges facing the city and the size of its ambitions.

Extensive interviews show, among other things, that the department is scheduled to begin chemical and biological training for entire units, with the goal of having 10,000 officers ready in time for the Republican National Convention, which is scheduled for Aug. 30 through Sept. 2 at Madison Square Garden. The department, too, is helping to prepare guidelines so police detectives and FBI agents can conduct joint investigations with city health department epidemiologists in the event of a biological attack.

Some health department officials will also obtain top-secret security clearances so they, too, can use classified information as part of those inquiries, officials said.

The department is preparing a plan to house and feed thousands of police officers, in some cases in city schools, to help keep them working in the aftermath of a catastrophic attack.

The agency's past performance in responding to catastrophes has not been an unmitigated success. Indeed, some critics have said that major gaps in coordination and planning were evident in its response to the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. But officials say it was partly to address many of those sorts of issues and to plan for the threats of the future that it brought in a team of experts, including David Cohen, a former top official at the Central Intelligence Agency, and Michael Sheehan, the State Department's counterterrorism chief under Clinton.

After a huge attack, officials acknowledge, the responsibilities of the Police Department would be enormous and potentially create a significant strain on manpower, despite a force of roughly 37,000 that makes it the nation's largest municipal police agency. Officers would be needed to provide security for hospitals, for the drug distribution centers and other locations. They would also play some role in securing or transporting the drugs from the strategic pharmaceutical stockpile, which is where the city would get antibiotics or vaccine to distribute after a biological attack.