WASHINGTON: A US grand jury indicted the Nigerian who plotted to blow up a plane on Christmas Day as Attorney General Eric Holder said a “global” hunt was tracking those who helped the alleged bomber.
Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, was indicted Wednesday by a grand jury on six counts arising from a botched Christmas Day plot to blow up an airliner packed with 290 passengers and crew as it approached Detroit, Michigan. The charges included attempted murder and trying to use a weapon of mass destruction aboard a US plane.
The would-be bomber’s apparent extremist ties meanwhile came under the spotlight Thursday, as a top Yemeni official said the suspect had met a US-Yemeni cleric accused by Washington of instigating terrorism. On Thursday, Yemen’s Deputy Prime Minister for Defense and Security Affairs, Rashad Al-Aleemi, revealed that Abdulmutallab had met with radical US-Yemeni cleric Anwar Al-Awlaqi.
“The Nigerian hid in Shabwa area in Wadi Rafadh (east of Sanaa) where he met Awlaqi and Mohammad Omair, who was killed in the air raid on Wadi Rafadh,” the minister said.
He was referring to a Dec. 24 raid carried out by Yemeni jets about 650 km east of the capital Sanaa, in which 34 suspected Al-Qaeda militants were killed, according to Yemeni officials.
Abdulmutallab was recruited by Al-Qaeda in London and met the cleric in Yemen, he said.
“The information provided to us is that Abdulmutallab joined Al-Qaeda in London.”
Michigan district court documents accused Abdulmutallab of “carrying a concealed bomb” containing Pentaerythritol Tetranitrate (PETN) and other explosives inside his clothing on board Northwest Airlines flight 253 from Amsterdam.
“The bomb was designed to allow defendant Abdulmutallab to detonate it at a time of his choosing, and to thereby cause an explosion aboard flight 253,” the documents added.
If convicted of trying to use a weapon of mass destruction, Abdulmutallab faces life imprisonment.
“This investigation is fast-paced, global and ongoing, and it has already yielded valuable intelligence that we will follow wherever it leads,” the attorney general said in the statement.
“Anyone we find responsible for this alleged attack will be brought to justice using every tool — military or judicial — available to our government.”
President Barack Obama Tuesday sharply rebuked intelligence and security services for missing a series of “red flags” which could have unmasked the plot earlier.
“It is increasingly clear that intelligence was not fully analyzed or fully leveraged,” Obama said after gathering agency chiefs and national security aides at a high-stakes White House meeting.
“That’s not acceptable, and I will not tolerate it,” he said in an unusual public dressing-down of the intelligence services.
Hours after charges were laid against Abdulmutallab, the Los Angeles Times reported that US border security officials were aware that he was on the Detroit-bound flight and were ready to question him on landing.
