BREAKING: 11 Terrorists With Links to Al-Qaeda Arrested for Disappearance of Flight #MH370
The Daily Mail reported:
- Suspects were arrested in the capital Kuala Lumpur and the state of Kedah
- Said to members of violent new terror group said to be planning attacks
- Interrogations came after demands from agencies including FBI and MI6
- Manifest revealed presence of consignment but did not reveal its contents
- Airline has admitted 200kg of lithium batteries was among the items
- It refused to say what else, citing ‘legal reason’ related to ‘ongoing’ probe
Related—
Al-Qaeda Informer Warned Authorities of Malaysian Islamists’ Plan to Hijack Plane
Saajid Badat is a British Islamist who was sentenced to 13 years in prison for plotting to blow up an aircraft with a shoe bomb.
** Saajid Badat said that he had been instructed at a terrorist training camp in Afghanistan to give a shoe bomb to the Malaysians.
The meeting between Badat and the Malaysian Islamists is believed to be before Saajid’s arrest in 2003.
Security experts say the information was “credible”.
The terrorists were arrested this week in the capital of Kuala Lumpur were being interrogated by officials over the disappearance of Malaysian flight MH370.
The Daily Mail reported:
A group of 11 terrorists with links to Al Qaeda were yesterday being interrogated on whether they are behind the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370.
The suspects were arrested in the capital Kuala Lumpur and in the state of Kedah last week and are members of a violent new terror group said to be planning bomb attacks in Muslim countries.
The interrogations come after international investigators, including the FBI and MI6, asked for the militants, whose ages range from 22 to 55 and include students, odd-job workers, a young widow and business professionals, to be questioned intensively about Flight MH370.
Nearly two months after the Beijing-bound plane vanished soon after take-off from Kuala Lumpur, no trace has been found despite a huge sea search costing hundreds of millions of pounds. It is thought to have crashed into the Indian Ocean with 239 people on board.
An officer with the Counter Terrorism Division of Malaysian Special Branch said yesterday the arrests had heightened suspicion that the flight’s disappearance may have been an act of terrorism.
The Southeast Asian nation has been a base for several militant groups, such as the al-Qaeda-linked Jemaah Islamiyah, blamed for the deadly 2002 Bali bombings.
UPDATE: Malaysian authorities on Sunday said the detained terrorists were not linked to the disappearance of flight MH370.