Saudis Bar Access To Terror Suspects

Report: Al Qaeda Suspects Won't Be Questioned By U.S. Agents

(AP)  Saudi authorities will not allow foreign security personnel to interrogate its 13 detained al Qaeda suspects, a government-controlled Saudi newspaper reported Wednesday, describing a policy that could strain U.S.-Saudi relations.

The daily Okaz said access to 11 Saudis, an Iraqi and a Sudanese will be limited to Saudi authorities because "the crimes that they committed or planned to carry out occurred or were going to take place on Saudi territories."

On Tuesday, Saudi Arabia announced its first al Qaeda-related arrests since Sept. 11 in a plot to shoot down a U.S. military plane stationed at a Saudi base. It alleged the suspects "were planning to carry out terrorist attacks against vital and important installations in the kingdom, by using explosives and two (surface-to-air) SA-7 missiles, smuggled into the kingdom and hidden in different places around the country."

Saudi Arabia has in the past resisted what it sees as outside interference in its justice system, and in doing so caused tension with the United States. In 1996, Saudi Arabia reportedly refused a request from U.S. officials to interrogate four Saudis who confessed to a car bomb attack at a U.S. military headquarters in Riyadh, which killed five Americans. The four were beheaded weeks later.

Since Sept. 11, there has been criticism in the United States at what is seen as too little effort by the Saudis to hunt down terrorists.

It took five months before the kingdom acknowledged that 15 of the Sept. 11 hijackers were Saudi. It has not taken part in a worldwide asset freeze of accounts linked to al Qaeda chief and exiled Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden or changed laws — as other Gulf states have — to crack down on money transferring or Islamic banking practices that al Qaeda may be abusing.

Also Wednesday, the Saudi-owned Al-Hayat newspaper reported the weapons and explosives that the suspects planned to use were smuggled in from neighboring Yemen.

Weapons are sold freely in Yemen and several suspected al Qaeda members are believed to have found shelter in the area in the country along the border with Saudi Arabia. The border area is largely controlled by armed tribes.

In October, Yemen and Saudi Arabia agreed to joint patrols of their common border as they pledged their support for the U.S.-led war on terror. Bin Laden has substantial support in both countries and traces his family roots to Yemen.

Al Qaeda is believed to be behind the October 2000 attack on the USS Cole that killed 17 American sailors in Yemen's Aden harbor.

The London-based Al-Hayat, which is privately owned but tends to reflect Saudi government thinking, also said that the Sudanese among the 13 arrested, believed to be an al Qaeda cell leader, fled the kingdom through Iraq after firing an anti-aircraft missile at a U.S. warplane in Saudi Arabia in May. He apparently made his way to Sudan, which announced earlier this week he had been transferred from Sudan to Saudi Arabia for trial.

The Saudi news agency, quoting an unidentified source at the Interior Ministry Tuesday, said that six Saudis and the Sudanese man were arrested several months ago, apparently the main plotters. It said the remaining six people arrested — five Saudis and an Iraqi — smuggled the Sudanese man out of the country. It was not clear when those six were arrested.

Okaz said the Sudanese man had confessed that he and six Saudis arrested with him were linked to al Qaeda and that they "received orders to carry out criminal plans and terrorist acts against vital installations in the kingdom." It said the six Saudis had returned from Afghanistan, but did not say when.

Bin Laden ran al Qaeda from Afghanistan until he was forced underground by a U.S. led bombing campaign following the Sept. 11 attacks for which he is blamed. Bin Laden's whereabouts now are unknown.

The Sudanese man was identified by U.S. officials as Abu Huzifa. He has acknowledged firing an SA-7 missile at a U.S. warplane at Prince Sultan Air Base, the U.S. military's regional command-and-control center and home to about 4,500 U.S. troops and several military aircraft.

In May, Saudi security guards found a missile launcher tube about two miles from a runway at the desert air base.

Bin Laden has based his opposition to the United States in part on the presence of U.S. troops, whom he calls infidels, in Saudi Arabia, home to Islam's holiest shrines. Prince Sultan, south of the Saudi capital of Riyadh, is being used in the war on terrorism as a command and control facility although Saudi Arabia has apparently barred the United States from stationing fighter bombers on its territory.

Saudi Arabia first invited troops to the country during the 1991 Gulf War to help defend the oil-rich nation against Saddam Hussein's forces.

In Washington, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher declined comment on the arrests Tuesday, except to say: "We've been very satisfied with Saudi cooperation in a wide variety of areas, whether its financial, law enforcement or other matters."

The Saudi Embassy in Washington issued a statement Tuesday saying that Saudi Arabia has asked Interpol to assist in the arrest of 750 people, including 214 Saudis, "many of which are suspected to be involved in money laundering, drug trafficking, and terrorist-related activities."