Ink bomb plot tip 'came from Saudi militant'

The tip-off that foiled the airline ink bomb plot came from a leading al-Qaida militant who surrendered to Saudi Arabia, Yemeni intelligence sources said today.

Jabir al-Fayfi, who turned himself in last month, told Saudi officials about the plan by al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, the terror group’s affiliate in Yemen.

US officials have said an alert from Saudi Arabia led to the interception of two explosive devices on planes in Britain and Dubai.

Saudi Arabia announced previously that al-Fayfi, a Saudi militant who had joined al Qaida in Yemen, had surrendered in late September.

The Saudi newspaper Al-Watan today said Saudi security officials gave US investigators the tracking numbers of the packages.

And a United Arab Emirates security official said it was sharing the bomb part serial numbers with the United States, Yemen and other countries involved in the probe in an effort to track the bombs’ origins.

In the US, counterterrorism officials warned local law enforcement and emergency personnel to be on the watch for mail with unusual characteristics that could mean dangerous substances are hidden inside.

The FBI and Homeland Security Department cautioned that foreign-origin packages without return addresses and excessive postage require a second look.

Major cargo firms have already suspended shipments from Yemen and today Germany’s aviation authority said it has extended its ban on cargo aircraft from Yemen to include passenger flights amid the current terrorist threat.

One of the bombs that was mailed from Yemen was routed to London through the UPS hub in Cologne.

Investigators were still piecing together the potency and construction of two bombs they believed were designed by the top explosives expert working for al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, the Yemen-based faction thought to be behind the plot.

Sources said they contained between 300 and 400 grams of PETN explosive. Six grams is considered enough to pierce an airliner’s skin.

The explosive is the hallmark of a series of recent terror attempts by al-Qaida in the Arab Peninsula, the militant faction suspected in the mail bomb plot.

US intelligence officials believe the suspected bombmaker is a 28-year-old Saudi named Ibrahim Hassan al-Asiri, thought to be in Yemen. Al-Asiri has been previously tied to a failed bombing attempt last Christmas Day on a Detroit-bound plane and an earlier failed attempt to kill a Saudi counterterrorism official. Both attempts used PETN.

The UAE security source said that a green mobile phone circuit board, but no SIM card, was connected to the HP printer head, which in turn was linked to the explosives. The security source said investigators are examining the circuit board to determine whether it had been used before in the hope it might provide clues to who sent the bomb.