SAUDI ARABIA: Saudi Arabia yesterday urged all fugitive militants to surrender after a top suspect in Riyadh's suicide bombings, also a suspected al-Qaeda operative, handed himself over to authorities.
Ali Abdulrahman al-Faqa'asi al-Ghamdi, accused by the US of being the mastermind of the May 12th bombings in Riyadh that killed 35 people, gave himself up at the home of an assistant interior minister, Saudi sources said.
"I think he surrendered himself to Prince Mohammad bin Nayef after dawn prayers," Interior Minister Prince Nayef said.
Saudi officials said the top suspect on a wanted list of 19 militants, issued days before the Riyadh attacks, was one of the suicide bombers. The second on the list was Turki Nasser Mishaal al-Dandani, who is still at large, and Ghamdi was third.
Saudi sources described Ghamdi as an explosives expert.
US officials said he had been captured but Saudi sources insisted Ghamdi had surrendered voluntarily and this would be recognised in court under Sharia Islamic law.
"All the wanted persons should surrender themselves. That is the only way because the security forces will reach them," Prince Nayef said.
He said 50 people had been arrested since the bombings at three Western compounds in Riyadh, which killed eight Americans.
The attacks shattered any sense Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of Islam, might be immune to the threat from Saudi-born Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda group, which was blamed for the blasts.
"This is a huge victory in the war against terrorism," Saudi ambassador to Washington Prince Bandar bin Sultan said after Ghamdi's detention.
Western sources in Saudi Arabia say the conservative Muslim kingdom is providing unprecedented co-operation in the crackdown on militants.
The kingdom had come under increasing pressure to tackle Saudi-based al-Qaeda elements and those who helped finance the group blamed for the September 11th, 2001, attacks on US cities.
In a sermon in Mecca yesterday, imam Sheikh Saleh bin Humaid warned that, if a country's security was breached, the "law of the jungle" and chaos would rule.