SAUDI ARABIA: A statement purportedly from al-Qaeda militants in Saudi Arabia warned yesterday of new attacks on US and western airlines. Meanwhile, a Saudi diplomat said that the group which had issued the threat was responsible for the attack on Sunday which killed Simon Cumbers, an Irish-born cameraman working for the BBC.
"All compounds, bases and means of transport, especially western and American airlines, will be a direct target for our coming operations in the near future," said the statement, which was posted on an Internet site sympathetic to al-Qaeda.
It urged Muslims to keep away from Americans and other westerners to avoid falling victim to an attack by the Islamic militant network led by Saudi-born Osama bin Laden.
Saudi security forces continued searching yesterday for the gunmen who shot dead cameraman Simon Cumbers (36), from Co Meath, and critically wounded the BBC's Security Correspondent, Frank Gardner (42), in an area of Riyadh known to be a militant stronghold.
Saudi special forces were guarding Mr Gardner in hospital last night in the belief that he may have been targeted.
Sunday's attack, the fourth in five weeks on westerners, heightened security fears among the tens of thousands of foreigners who are living and working in the country which is the world's largest oil exporter.
"We also warn security forces and guards of crusader [western\] compounds and American bases and all those who stand with America, its agents . . . and the tyrants of the Saudi government, and urge them to repent," said the statement.
The BBC said that Mr Gardner, who sustained gunshot wounds mainly in the abdomen, was in a stable condition last night after extensive surgery.
Mr Jamal Khashoggi, media adviser to Prince Turki al-Faisal, Saudi ambassador to Britain, said in London that those responsible for killing Mr Cumbers and wounding Mr Gardner were linked to al-Qaeda.
"It was an easy job for these militants because they had spent some time in the area. I believe it was an opportunistic strike," he said. "These militants want to send a message that the kingdom is not safe for westerners."
Mr Khashoggi vowed that the Saudi police, who have so far avoided a large-scale crackdown, would now take tougher measures against militants.
Prince Turki, the kingdom's former intelligence chief, speculated that the militants were seeking out individuals and soft targets as a result of the security clampdown.
Britain's ambassador to Riyadh, Mr Sherard Cowper-Coles, said that the BBC team, who were with a Saudi information ministry guide, appeared to have been victims of an opportunist rather than an organised attack.
"Westerners operating in this area of Riyadh with a camera would obviously be vulnerable," he told the BBC, adding that there was a "serious and chronic terrorist threat" in Saudi Arabia.
Riyadh's Suweidi district is a stronghold of al-Qaeda and 15 of the 26 most wanted militants in the kingdom, including the leader of the group in Saudi Arabia, Abdulaziz al-Muqrin, come from there.
Saudi Arabia has been battling against al-Qaeda for more than a year and its security forces have arrested or clashed with many suspected militants in Suweidi in recent months. Sunday's attack came a week after al-Qaeda militants killed 22 people, 19 of them foreigners, in a shooting and hostage-taking spree in the oil city of Khobar. - (Reuters)