JEDDAH, 4 September 2004 — Saudi security forces yesterday killed a suspected terrorist and arrested another in the central city of Buraidah hours after a police officer was shot dead and three of his colleagues were wounded in a gun-battle in the city, 340 kilometers northwest of the capital.
An Interior Ministry official said the suspect was hunted down during an operation yesterday morning as security forces chased militants following a Thursday night shootout.
The ministry identified the slain police officer as Yousuf ibn Ayed Al-Harbi but did not name the dead terrorist. However, it pointed out that the man was wanted on security issues. It said security agents arrested a suspected terrorist for taking part in Thursday’s shootout.
Authorities said the security officer was killed while two police patrols were on their way to investigate a report received at 8.30 p.m. that two women and two armed men had driven out of a house in Al-Khaleej district.
“Security authorities are still investigating the incident as some suspects were arrested while weapons, ammunition and explosives were found in the house which the suspects had left behind,” the ministry official said.
Dubai-based Al-Arabiya news channel also said that one security man was in critical condition after being injured in the clashes. It said the gunbattles continued into the early hours of Friday and security forces laid siege to one neighborhood as a helicopter hovered over.
Okaz Arabic daily said security patrols chased two wanted terrorists who opened fire from their vehicle, killing a security man and injuring three others, one seriously. Security forces combed the area in search of the gunmen, it said.
Funeral prayers for Harbi were held at King Fahd Mosque in Buraidah yesterday. Deputy Qasim Governor Prince Abdul Aziz ibn Majed and a large number of Saudis attended the prayers.
The deputy governor also visited the three officers injured in the shootout at King Fahd Specialist Hospital in Buraidah.
He told the officers that the Saudi leadership was happy with their courageous efforts to foil terrorist operations. He also wished the officers speedy recovery.
The Interior Ministry later said it had found a Kalashnikov with six boxes of live ammunition, a rocket propelled grenade launcher, a highly explosive bomb, other explosive material and devices, four booby-trapped mobile phone handsets, two generators and SR21,000 in cash at the Buraidah house where the terror suspects were living.
Security forces have repeatedly clashed with suspected Al-Qaeda extremists blamed for a wave of violence in the Kingdom, which began in May 2003, and many have been killed in gunbattles.
In the previous reported clash, the Interior Ministry said that security forces killed a suspected terrorist and arrested four people during raids late Monday on sites suspected of sheltering wanted terrorists in the eastern city of Al-Ahsa.
On Thursday, the ministry announced that a terrorist wanted for a shooting and hostage-taking rampage in the eastern city of Alkhobar which left 22 people dead in May had turned himself in.
Only six terrorists took up an amnesty offered by Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Fahd in June to suspected terrorists to turn themselves in within a month.
Saudi authorities have since repeatedly warned that terrorists who did not surrender would be crushed.
Only one of the six terrorists who surrendered under the royal pardon was on a list of 26 most-wanted extremists, 11 of whom remain at large.
Some 90 people have been killed and hundreds hurt in the spate of bombings and shootings in the Kingdom since May last year.
