RIYADH, 31 January 2004 — Saudi security forces arrested seven terror suspects in raids on two militants’ hideouts in Riyadh, the Interior Ministry said yesterday. A car wired with explosives, rocket-propelled grenades, guns and ammunition were also seized in the raids. Ministry officials said the militants had been ready to carry out an attack.
The disclosure came as the death toll of Saudi security officers, shot by unidentified gunmen as they searched the Riyadh home of a detained militant, rose to six.
The ministry statement said security forces found a car rigged with explosives, rifles and pistols in one of the hideouts on Thursday. In the other they seized rocket-propelled grenades and grenade launchers, five hand grenades, 40 electronic explosive capsules, ammunition, as well as 21 belts and five mobile phones all rigged with explosives.
Both the sites raided were in Riyadh’s eastern Al-Siliye District close to the house where the seven people were attacked on Thursday. The statement identified the six dead security officers as Khaled Al-Humaidan, Abdullah Al-Baqami, Naif Al-Motairy, Abdullah Al-Otaibi, Yahya Al-Qahtani and Abdullah Al-Ahmary.
It named the arrested militant as Khaled ibn Hamoud Al-Farraj and his father, who was killed in the gun attack, as Hamoud ibn Juwair Al-Farraj. The statement said Khaled Farraj had links with the new group of militants who were planning the foiled attack.
Riyadh Governor Prince Salman earlier attended funeral prayer for the father of the militant and the six security men killed in Thursday’s shooting in Riyadh’s eastern district of Nassim. The governor denied reports that the police operation was a raid. The police had gone to the house for a routine search and had not expected an attack.
“They (the militants) killed two officers stationed at the front door, along with the father, then entered the house and killed three others and wounded a fourth who died today, and two others,” the governor said. “The security forces did not fire a single shot... because they did not expect to encounter terrorists.”
On Thursday an Interior Ministry official gave the reasons for the police visit. “Based on information received about the existence of weapons and explosives at the residence of a man wanted on security charges, a (security) unit went there, accompanied by his father,” he said.
“Police found two hand grenades, two machine guns and five pistols. As the unit was completing its task, (it came) under heavy fire from unknown elements,” the official said.
“The Interior Ministry statement said the whole truth. There was no raid on the house and there was no exchange of fire with the criminals,” said Prince Salman.
Security forces were told by the detained militant that he kept weapons at his home and went there, accompanied by his father, to search the premises, said Prince Salman.
Saudi security forces clashed with gunmen in the Nassim district on Jan. 18, and the capital’s police chief subsequently said “a number of suspects” had been detained.
Security forces have repeatedly clashed with suspected militants in the past months in the hunt for extremists presumed to be associated with the Al-Qaeda terror network. Several security personnel have been killed in the shootouts.
Hundreds of suspected extremists have been rounded up since last May’s triple bombings of residential compounds in Riyadh that killed 35 people.
