JEDDAH, 6 December 2003 — Security forces captured two terror suspects following a shootout in a Taif suburb, a newspaper reported yesterday. A third suspect managed to escape.

“A member of the security forces became suspicious of a car, parked in the Sharqiya district, and went to check the identity of the person in the car, when a second person appeared and began firing at him and then escaped,” Al-Watan newspaper reported.

The authorities arrested the person in the car, at which point the person who escaped returned with a third individual and exchanged fire with the security forces, injuring a Yemeni resident in the vicinity.

“Authorities arrested the second suspect after he ran out of ammunition while the third person managed to escape. Sources indicated that the two individuals have previous records,” said Al-Watan.

In a separate incident, the daily added, security forces arrested two individuals Wednesday after searching their car and discovering a Kalashnikov hidden underneath a jacket with eight bullets loaded.

The two individuals arrested were not labeled as terrorists nor were they said to be affiliated to any terrorist cells.

Meanwhile, the manager of the Seder Village in Riyadh said the US and British Embassy warnings of an imminent terrorist attack on the compound terrified its residents despite extensive security arrangements already in place.

Richard May, the British manager of the complex, told the Associated Press that the warnings were triggered by the discovery during a raid of a videotape which showed militants had the housing compound under active surveillance.

May said Seder Village officials were notified more than a week ago by the National Guard that the videotape had been discovered in a Nov. 25 raid on terrorist suspects.

“We don’t know exactly what was on this tape. We never saw it, but we were informed by the Saudi officials that there were some external shots taken of the compound from various points,” May said.

He said the Saudi officials asked the compound to upgrade security. A week after the discovery of the tape, the US and British embassies Tuesday named Seder Village as a possible terrorism target. They said Seder Village was under “active surveillance” by terrorists.

Everything was under control at the complex until the embassies’ warnings, which created an “unnecessary panic” among its 500 residents, May said. Some feared the attack would be that night and moved into hotels, and many returned the next day after realizing the “immediate threat didn’t exist,” he said.

The residents are mainly Westerners, but Americans are a minority in the compound, he said.

On Wednesday, the Interior Ministry announced the first arrest in the Nov. 8 suicide bombing at the Muhaya housing compound in Riyadh that killed 17 people and wounded more than 120.

Heightened security was apparent in rain-soaked Riyadh following the warnings and two rounds of deadly attacks since May on compounds housing foreigners. Armored personnel carriers were parked outside Western housing complexes and soldiers armed with semiautomatic rifles stood behind sandbags at checkpoints set up at key intersections in the Saudi capital.