Official: Hostages Freed in Saudi Arabia
Sunday May 30, 2004 7:31 AM
guardian.co.uk
By DONNA ABU-NASR
Associated Press Writer
KHOBAR, Saudi Arabia (AP) - Tens of American, European and other hostages were released Sunday and a gunman believed to be the lead Islamic militant holding them was arrested, a Saudi security official said, adding that two other gunmen were ``in the process of being arrested.''
The Saudi security official would not comment on the whereabouts or conditions of the hostages, saying only: ``It has ended. One has been arrested and two are in the process of being arrested - they are surrounded.''
The crisis ended about 25 hours after it began Saturday morning with gunmen wearing military-style dress opening fire and engaging in shootouts with Saudi security forces at two oil industry compounds housing offices and employee apartments in Khobar, 250 miles northeast of Riyadh, killing at least 10 people. They then fled up the street into a high-rise in Oasis Residential Resorts complex, where they took the hostages.
Several Saudi newspapers reported Sunday that the attackers threw at least one body from the building where they were holed up and had mutilated some of the bodies of those they killed.
Reporters were kept back from the compound, but a green bus carrying Saudi troops as well as some police cars and ambulances could be seen pulling out of it; they did not appear rushed or use sirens.
A soldier on the scene said that seven gunmen had been arrested. When told that security officials were saying two were not yet in custody, he said they were on two floors that troops had not yet reached.
Neither the soldier nor the security official would comment further, with the security official saying the Saudi Interior Ministry would issue a statement on the resolution later.
Saudi security forces earlier had stormed the walled housing compound and surrounded the attackers on the sixth floor of a building. A security official said one attempt during the night to storm the building where the hostages were being held was abandoned after booby traps were discovered.
But just after sunrise, three security forces helicopters arrived and dropped off commandos. Moderate gunfire, which had been heard sporadically overnight, rang out again and within a few hours, the standoff was over.
Security officials have said between 45 and 60 people were being held hostage, mostly Westerners including Americans, Italians and Dutch. But in Rome, the Italian Foreign Ministry said there were no Italians among the hostages. The Dutch Foreign Ministry said three Dutch hostages had been released ``in coordination with local authorities.''
A statement posted on several Islamic Web sites claimed the attack in the name of the Al-Quds (Jerusalem) Brigade and was signed the ``al-Qaida in the Arab Peninsula.'' It said the attacks targeted U.S. companies and that a number of ``crusaders'' had been killed.
One Saudi official security official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the method of the attack was ``definitely inspired by al-Qaida.''
The attack was the second deadly assault this month against the Saudi oil industry and came as oil prices have been driven to new highs partly by fears that the Saudi kingdom - the world's largest oil producer - is unable to protect itself from terrorists.
``The terrorists' goal is to disrupt the Saudi economy and destabilize our country. But they will not succeed,'' Saudi ambassador Prince Bandar bin Sultan said in a statement released in Washington. ``With every desperate act of violence, our effort and resolve to destroy the terrorists only grows.''
The Arab satellite station Al-Arabiya reported the Saudi oil minister met with oil executives to assure them that the attack would not affect oil supplies. He planned to meet ambassadors on Sunday for the same purpose, the station said without attribution.
Osama bin Laden, the Saudi-born, anti-Western Islamic extremist blamed for past terror attacks in Saudi Arabia and the United States, has vowed to destabilize the oil industry and undermine the kingdom for its close ties to the United States.
Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah said about 10 Saudis and foreigners were killed in the Khobar attack. The Saudi newspaper Al-Riyadh, quoting security officials in its Sunday edition, put the number dead at 16, including seven Saudi security agents. An American man, a 10-year-old Egyptian boy and three Filipinos were among those confirmed killed. British citizens and Saudi guards were also reportedly among the dead.
The Arab News, quoting witnesses, said the attackers dragged the body of an unidentified victim behind their car along a highway. Gunmen who attacked an oil contractor's office in western Saudi Arabia earlier this month dragged the body of an American victim from the bumper of their car.
According to Oasis residents and an employee, the militants asked questions when they arrived that indicated they were trying to separate Muslims from non-Muslims. Islamic militants have been criticized in the Arab world for previous attacks in which Saudis and other Arabs were killed.
Lebanon's ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Ahmed Chammat, told The Associated Press that five Lebanese hostages had been released.
One of them, Orora Naoufal, said she cowered in her apartment with her 4-year-old son for five hours after a brief encounter with two of the gunmen, whom she described as clean-shaven and wearing military uniforms.
She told AP by telephone that the gunmen asked her where the ``infidels'' and foreigners were, and whether she was Muslim or Christian.
``I replied: 'I am Lebanese and there are no foreigners here.''' She said the gunmen told her to ``Go convert to Islam, and cover up and go back to your country.''
The Oasis compound is upscale expatriate housing that includes neighborhood necessities - shops, restaurants, playgrounds, fitness centers - in addition to a hotel and leisurely extras such as a grassy beach in a private Gulf cove and an ice-skating rink, according to the compound's Web site.
One of the targeted oil industry compounds contains offices and apartments for the Arab Petroleum Investment Corporation, or Apicorp, and the other - the Petroleum Center building - houses offices of various international firms.
In addition to Apicorp, oil industry companies with offices in the compounds include a joint venture among Royal Dutch/Shell Group, Total SA and Saudi Aramco; Lukoil Holdings of Russia; and China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., or Sinopec.
The Egyptian boy who was killed was the son of an Apicorp employee, said Mahmoud Ouf, an Egyptian consular officer in Riyadh. Apicorp, in a brief statement published in the Saudi newspaper Al-Jazirah on Sunday, said three of its employees were among the dead. Apicorp is the investment arm of the Organization of Arab Petroleum Countries.
Employees from the other companies were safe, Shell spokesman Simon Buerk and a Saudi oil industry official, Yahya Shinawi, told AP by telephone.
Other companies believed to be there included Schlumberger, based in Houston, Texas, and Aveva, of Cambridge, England. There was no immediate word on their employees.
In Washington, U.S. State Department spokesman Tom Casey said an American man who worked for an oil company was confirmed dead, but did not identify him or his employer.
The U.S. Embassy in Saudi Arabia reiterated a call to its citizens to leave the kingdom.
A diplomat in Khobar said the three Filipinos killed included two shot in the Petroleum Center building and a third shot in the Oasis residential compound.
In London, the British Foreign Office was investigating reports that a British citizen was killed.
Two security guards also were believed to be dead, according to a Western diplomat who spoke on condition of anonymity.
The attack came as Saudi Arabia, OPEC's most powerful member, is urging the oil producers' cartel to boost oil production to try to reduce the high cost of crude.
Peter Gignoux, a London-based oil adviser for GDP Associates in New York, said news of the attacks might trigger a further rise in oil prices but noted that oil facilities were unaffected.
Michael Rothman, chief energy strategist at Merrill Lynch in New York, also said there might be ``a limited psychological reaction'' in oil markets but that the attack would not affect supply.
Saudi Arabia launched a high-profile crackdown on terrorists after attacks on Riyadh housing compounds in 2003, and claims to have foiled dozens of terror plots in the kingdom.
The most recent attack targeted the offices of Houston-based ABB Lummus Global Inc. in the western city of Yanbu on May 1, killing six Westerners and a Saudi.
Saudi Arabia relies heavily on 6 million expatriate workers, including about 30,000 Americans, to run its oil industry and other sectors. The kingdom produces about 8 million barrels of oil a day.
Many expatriates left, at least temporarily, after the Yanbu attack. Then, U.S. Ambassador James C. Oberwetter advised Americans to leave the country - a move criticized by Saudi officials.
Saudi state television tried to rally citizens against terrorism, airing interviews with victims of he Khobar shooting as well as with children interviewed at random and intellectuals, all denouncing extremist violence. The Saudi crackdown on extremists has included a public relations campaign aimed at discouraging Saudis from offering any kind of support to extremists.
The shock of terrorism at home has led to an unprecedented public discussion in Saudi Arabia about whether the austere version of Islam expounded in the kingdom might contribute to extremist violence. |
