JEDDAH: Eleven Al-Qaeda-linked militants who had been released from the Kingdom’s prisons killed two Saudi border guards while trying to cross into Yemen yesterday before being captured, the Interior Ministry said.
A ministry statement said a group of 10 Saudis and a Yemeni ambushed a Saudi border patrol just before dawn in the Sharourah sector of Najran Province, killing the two guards. Four militants were seriously wounded in the ambush, the statement added.
It said identity papers belonging to the Saudi nationals showed they had all been previously imprisoned for crimes relating to the deviant group, which refers to Al-Qaeda.
The ministry identified the slain security officers as Fahd bin Hussein Al-Hamnadi and Muhammad bin Hassan Munie.
The arrested militants are: Nahad Khaled Al-Otaibi, Muhammad Faraj Al-Anazi, Khalil Hassan Al-Zahrani, Bandar Diar Al-Harbi, Abdullah Saad Al-Saeeri, Muhammad Salim Al-Saeeri, Fahd Muhammad Al-Shahri, Ali Abdullah Al-Salama, Eisa Awad Al-Otaibi and Khaled Faisal Al-Otaibi.
The ministry said it had released these militants in 2011 and 2012 after they underwent a counseling program.
The ministry said the arrested terrorists would be punished according to the Shariah. It urged the public to inform authorities about suspicious activities of such militants to prevent their attacks.
Earlier this year, the Kingdom announced it had busted two Al-Qaeda cells in Riyadh and Jeddah that had planned to carry out bomb attacks in the country.
Saudi security forces have arrested thousands of suspected militants over the past decade, crushing an Al-Qaeda bombing campaign inside the country from 2003-2006, and putting hundreds of them through a rehabilitation program.
11 Al-Qaeda men who killed two border guards captured
