Al-Qaida fingerprints on blast

OSAMA BIN LADEN’S al-Qaida terror network was last night being blamed for the synchronised suicide bombings of western compounds in the Saudi Arabian capital that killed up to 91 people.

An angry US President George W Bush denounced the bombings as the work of “killers whose only faith is hate”. He vowed to find those behind “the killers and they will learn the meaning of American justice.” The attacks took place on Monday night, on the eve of US Secretary of State Colin Powell’s visit to Riyadh.

A sombre Mr Powell visited one the bomb sites yesterday. “This was a well-planned terrorist attack. It certainly has all the fingerprints of an al-Qaida operation,” he said.

The attackers shot their way into the three housing compounds and then set off multiple suicide car bombs. A Saudi Interior Ministry official said seven Americans, seven Saudis, two Jordanians, two Filipinos, one Lebanese and one Swiss were among those killed. Australia said one of its citizens also died. He said 194 people were wounded, most of them slightly.

US Vice President Dick Cheney said “some 91 people were killed”. But Saudi officials had said earlier that 29 had died, including nine bombers.

The bombings, which took place about 11.30pm (21.20 Irish time), constituted the deadliest terror attack on Americans since September 11, 2001. There was no claim of responsibility. If the al-Qaida connection is confirmed, it would show that bin Laden’s network is still capable of mounting co-ordinated attacks, even in one of the world’s most tightly-policed countries. Bin Laden, a renegade Saudi multi-millionaire, has targeted the US because of its military presence in his country.

The Riyadh attack came as the US is pulling out most of the 5,000 troops it had based in Saudi Arabia, whose presence fuelled anti-US sentiment.

“This could be the beginning of a major campaign aimed at the Americans,” said exiled Saudi opposition activist Saad al-Fagih, head of the London-based Movement for Islamic Reform in Arabia.

A spokesman for the Department of Foreign Affairs said a small number of Irish citizens, believed to be less than a dozen, were residing in the Al-Hamra complex, one of the three compounds attacked, but no Irish casualties had been detected.