Saudi officials say they warned British Intelligence about terror threat to London |
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Published
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Mon, 08 Aug 2005 09:05
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In a further new twist, it has been reported that Saudi Arabia had warned British Intelligence officials that London could be a possible target of terrorists.
A Saudi official was quoted as saying that it was being investigated whether Kareem al-Majati, identified as al-Qaeda chief in Saudi Arabia, had made any direct calls to the mastermind behind the July 7 bombings, "It was clear to us that there was a terror group planning an attack in the UK. We passed all this information on to both MI5 and MI6 at the time. We are now investigating whether these calls were directly to the London bombers.
It is our conclusion that either these were linked or that a completely different terror network is still at large in Britain," the official said. He added that al-Qaeda's logistics expert; Younes al-Hayari had also made some calls to Britain. It must be recalled that al-Hayari was killed in a shoot-out four days before the London bombings.
Prince Turki al Faisal, the Saudi ambassador to Britain confirmed that the M15 and the M16 had indeed been warned about the threat, "There was certainly close liaison between the Saudi Arabian intelligence authorities and the British intelligence authorities some time ago, when information was passed to Britain about a heightened terrorist threat to London," Prince Turki was quoted as saying in the Sunday Telegraph.
It was also being investigated if certain money transfers were made by the Saudi-based Moroccans Kareem Al Majati and Younes Al Hayari, "We are trying to establish whether the money was directly linked to the individuals who carried out either the first or the second sets of bombings in London," a Saudi security adviser told the paper. So far there have been no comments from the Foreign Office or the Home Office on these reports. But if it turns out that Saudi Arabia did indeed warn the Intelligence services of a threat to London, then Intelligence officials will have to do some explaining on why they did not act on these reports.
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