Saudi Arabia has begun setting up special security units to protect the Kingdom’s oil facilities from terrorist attacks, Interior Minister Prince Naif Bin Abdel Aziz said on Sunday.
The statement is the first public admission by a high-ranking Saudi official that the country’s oil infrastructure is in need of tighter security due to the threat posed by terrorists.
No further details about the units were given.
Prince Naif’s comments follow a meeting with Saudi’s Shoura Council where he gave the consultative government body an overview of the ministry’s current efforts to combating terrorism.
Prince Naif said the ministry had foiled a number of dangerous terrorist plots, which if successful would have caused “a disastrous situation”.
However, he added that greater efforts had to be made to combat the threat.
Saudi Arabia has been cracking down on suspected militants ever since terrorists launched a campaign of attacks against Western targets in 2003.
Since then the country has witnessed a stream of terrorist violence against westerners, culminating in a foiled attack on the Abqaiq oil facility in the east of the country.
The Abqaiq plant is one of the largest oil processing facilities in the world and is responsible for more than 60% of Saudi production.
If the attack had been successful, the resulting affect on oil production could have been devastating.
In April the Interior Ministry announced 172 terror suspects had been arrested, some of who were allegedly planning airborne attacks on the country’s oil infrastructure.
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