|
Dirty bomb arrest Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20020611/ap_wo_en_ge/hungary_us_terrorism_13http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20020611/ap_wo_en_ge/hungary_us_terrorism_13
Ashcroft says arrest of U.S. suspect `significantly disrupted' dirty-bomb plot
Tue Jun 11,11:16 AM ET
By GEORGE JAHN, Associated Press Writer
BUDAPEST, Hungary - The arrest of an American suspected of working with al-Qaida "significantly disrupted" plans to set off a bomb that scatters radioactivity in the United States, U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft ( news - web sites) said Tuesday.
But other threats remained, Ashcroft warned while on a swing through the Hungarian capital, describing the suspect Jose "Pucho" Padilla as someone apparently "involved with al-Qaida in very serious terrorist plots."
He did not elaborate on whether authorities had information to suggest that Padilla had plotted other attacks beyond the alleged plan to detonate a "dirty bomb" in Washington or elsewhere on American soil.
"We believe that by his detention that we have significantly disrupted a potential plot to deploy a dirty bomb, an explosive device, in the United States. We believe his continued detention is the right course of action," Ashcroft said.
Speaking to reporters between talks with Hungarian leaders, Ashcroft warned against complacency in the wake of the arrest.
"We believe that there is a continuing terrorist threat that requires the vigilance of citizens and freedom-loving people around the world," he told reporters at the International Law Enforcement Academy, a joint U.S.-Hungarian anti-crime training center.
In separate detentions made public Tuesday by officials in Morocco, police there arrested three Saudi nationals who were allegedly planning attacks against U.S. and British warships in the Strait of Gibraltar.
Authorities described Padilla, also known as Abdullah al Mujahir, as a former gang member from Chicago who was raised as a Catholic but converted to Islam.
They said the alleged scheme went only as far as the planning stages. U.S. Undersecretary of State John Bolton indicated Padilla was carrying plans for the attack when he was picked up in Chicago.
Dirty bombs combine traditional explosives with radioactive material. While they don't create a nuclear explosion, they could release small amounts of radioactive material over dozens of city blocks.
Ashcroft argued against complaints that new powers given to the FBI ( news - web sites) and other measures introduced to combat terror impinge on civil rights.
"The fight against terrorism is (actually) a fight to secure civil rights," he said. "It is the terrorist who threatens the liberty, freedom, equality, human dignity and even the existence of humanity."
"I have told them that we can think outside the box," he said, alluding to law enforcement agents. "But we can never think outside the Constitution."
Ashcroft arrived from Russia and was to leave for Switzerland later in the day. He met Prime Minister Peter Medgyessy and Interior Minister Monika Lamperth, and thanked Hungarian authorities for being an "excellent partner in combatting organized crime."
Hungary recently increased measures against money-laundering, he told reporters, referring to a key concern in the anti-terror campaign: identifying and drying up the financial assets of al-Qaida and similar groups.
In Moscow on Monday, Ashcroft and Russian law enforcement officials discussed ways to boost their agencies' cooperation in fighting terrorism and transnational crime, including what they called the growing Afghan drug trade.
|
|
