Qaeda boasts Saudi bomber evaded checkpoints - SITE

Al-Qaeda has boasted that the suicide bomber who tried to kill the Saudi deputy interior minister had managed to pass security checkpoints and to board a private aircraft, SITE Intelligence said on Sunday.

A statement posted on jihadist forums by Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula said Abdullah Hassan Taleh Asiri passed through checkpoints at Najran airport, near the Yemeni border, and Jeddah airport, the US monitoring service said.

He then boarded Prince Mohammed bin Nayef's private jet with his explosives, according to the statement, which said he finally blew himself up amongst the prince's guards.

"The essence and the method of detonation are not and will never be known," the Al-Qaeda statement said.

"Receive glad tidings, O you tyrants, of what will hurt you. Your fortresses will never prevent us from reaching you. We have scaled their walls and we will reach you very soon," it said.

Asiri was on a list of 85 men wanted by the Saudi authorities, it added.

Yemeni Foreign Minister Abu Bakr al-Kurbi said on Sunday that the bomber was in Yemen before crossing to Saudi Arabia.

"This Saudi element was in Yemen among a Saudi terrorist group which is being chased... Yemen has not stopped hunting for them," he told AFP.

Official Saudi news agency SPA reported on Friday that Prince Mohammed, a royal family member who leads the kingdom's anti-terror fight, escaped with just minor injuries from the suicide bomb attack in Jeddah.

Apart from the bomber, who was killed, no other serious casualties were reported.

The royal court said the bomber was a wanted "terrorist" who had approached the prince under the pretext that he wanted to give himself up. He detonated his device while he was undergoing security checks, it added.

Prince Mohammed is the son of long-time Interior Minister Prince Nayef bin Abdul Aziz, who has been in office since 1975. He serves as the minister's assistant for security affairs.

This was the first high-profile Al-Qaeda attack on the Saudi government since militants rammed a car bomb into the fortified interior ministry in Riyadh in 2004.

It was also the first strike on a member of the royal family since Al-Qaeda launched a wave of attacks in the kingdom in 2003, targeting Western establishments and oil facilities and killing more than 150 Saudis and foreigners.

SITE said on Sunday that the Al-Qaeda statement also claimed it has uncovered a Saudi spy network in Yemen.

"Allah has also enabled us to uncover a network of spies and agents belonging to this criminal about which the government of Yemen knew nothing. There are interesting details which we will expose at a later time, Allah willing," it cited the statement as saying.

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