JEDDAH, 7 August 2004 — Police in the southern city of Abha, who on Thursday arrested Faris Al-Zahrani, the 11th most wanted terrorist on a list published by the Interior Ministry, have transferred him to Riyadh for further interrogation.
The arrest of Zahrani, 27, came six weeks after security forces killed local Al-Qaeda commander, Abdul Aziz Al-Muqrin, and is hailed as a major blow to terrorists who spurned the amnesty offer made by authorities.
“Security forces... were able on Thursday evening to capture one of the heads of strife and an advocate of takfeer and bombings,” said an overnight Interior Ministry statement on Zahrani’s arrest. “Takfeer” means branding other Muslims as infidels in order to legitimize violence against them.
A ministry official said another person was arrested along with Zahrani, but his identity would not be disclosed “for the sake of the (national) interest.” Police seized a gun, a forged civil ID card and a Toyota car from them.
Security forces were able to “prevent the two men from using the weapons they were carrying and capture them alive without anyone being hurt,” the official said. He said Zahrani had “questioned the nation’s ulema (clergy)” and incited militants to “kill security forces.”
Sheikh Safar Al-Hawali, a mediator between the authorities and the terrorists, said that Zahrani was “one of those contacted to negotiate their surrender”.
“The last contact with him was around two weeks ago,” he said, adding that Zahrani’s response to the call for surrender was that he would “either be victorious (in his fight against the government) or manage to escape”.
Hawali said that Zahrani had “not left the southern region” in the weeks before his detention, adding that “it appears that he has not participated in recent attacks.”
