World

Report: Kuwait Foils Terror Plot

November 9, 2000 / 1:10 PM EST / AP

Terrorism suspects in Kuwaiti custody had planned to attack a U.S. Army camp as well as residences and vehicles of Western military officers, Al-Watan newspaper reported Friday.

Police on Thursday announced the arrests of the three men, who authorities said had 293 pounds of high explosives and five hand grenades. The Interior Ministry said the suspects, along with a fourth Arab still at large, were preparing to sabotage targets in and outside the country, but it did not specify them.

Al-Watan said Camp Doha, north of Kuwait City, was a "major" target. It houses prepositioned weapons and hundreds of American servicemen and women. The daily newspaper did not reveal its sources, but its security reports have a history of accuracy.

Interior Ministry officials could not be reached for comment Friday, the weekend in Kuwait.

The men were preparing to attack residential buildings where Western officers live as well as Western military vehicles traveling on Kuwaiti roads, Al-Watan said. It did not provide any details about the targets abroad.

In recent days, authorities have placed soldiers armed with machine guns in front of two high-rise buildings where several Westerners live in Bneid al-Gar, a suburb of Kuwait City.

Some 5,000 U.S. troops are in Kuwait, plus several hundred British airmen and women using Kuwait's air bases to patrol "no-fly" zones imposed on Iraq after the 1991 Gulf War that liberated Kuwait from a seven-month Iraqi occupation. A Western military presence is part of postwar defense pacts between Kuwait and its main allies.

Al-Watan published photographs it said were provided by the Interior Ministry of security men unearthing explosives in what appeared to be a patch of desert. In one photograph, red and brown packs of explosives were visible in a metal chest still in the ground with its lid open.

The pro-government daily Al-Siyassah said Friday that the suspect at large was Moroccan and had entered Kuwait from Iran using a forged Saudi passport. The newspaper did not identify its "security sources" by name.

The Interior Ministry had said the fugitive was a citizen of a north African country who had carried a fake passport from a Gulf state.

U.S. forces in Kuwait and elsewhere in the Gulf were placed on the highest level of alert last month for fear that more attacks would follow the Oct. 12 bombing of the USS Cole in Aden, Yemen. The attack killed 17 U.S. sailors and injured 39.

Kuwaiti press reports have linked those arrested to terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden, but Kuwaiti officials would not comment on that. Washington blames bin Laden, who is thought to be holed up in Afghanistan, for the 1998 bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. He also is a prime suspect in the USS Cole bombing.

In Yemen, well-placed Yemeni sources said Thursday night that there was no connection between the arrests in Kuwait and four fugitives being sought as prt of the Cole investigation. The sources spoke on condition of anonymity.

U.S. State Department spokesman Richard Boucher has said only that U.S. officials were in touch with the Kuwaitis on the subject and that Kuwait has been cooperative with the United States on terrorism issues.