A photo released by the U.S. Marshals Service on Monday shows 23-year-old… (U.S. Marshals Service )
Reporting from Washington — U.S. counter-terrorism officials on Saturday were looking at possible connections between Al Qaeda-linked militants in Yemen and a 23-year-old Nigerian man charged with attempting to destroy a Northwest Airlines plane on its final approach to Detroit Metropolitan airport.
According to a criminal complaint and FBI affidavit, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab carried a destructive device aboard Flight 253 on Christmas Day in what authorities said was an attempted terrorist attack that could have killed all 290 people aboard.
In filing charges Saturday, the Justice Department alleged that Abdulmutallab had a device containing the explosive PETN, or pentaerythritol tetranitrate, attached to his body. The court documents also said that FBI agents had recovered what appeared to be the remnants of a syringe, believed to be part of the device, from the vicinity of the suspect's seat.
"Had this alleged plot to destroy an airplane been successful, scores of innocent people would have been killed or injured," Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. said in announcing the charges. "We will continue to investigate this matter vigorously, and we will use all measures available to our government to ensure that anyone responsible for this attempted attack is brought to justice."
A senior U.S. counter-terrorism official said that in Abdulmutallab's initial interviews with the FBI and Customs and Border Protection agents, the suspect "was saying he was acting alone, and not part of some larger connected plot."
Abdulmutallab, who was burned in Friday's incident, was under protective guard at a Detroit-area hospital Saturday. Under questioning, he seemed cooperative, "but who knows if he's telling the truth. Maybe that's the instructions you get [from Al Qaeda] for when you get caught," said the senior official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he, like others, was not authorized to publicly discuss the expanding investigation.
Federal authorities had been alarmed enough Friday, the official added, to alert about 128 other planes flying from Europe to the United States to prepare for similar attacks. All of those flights landed without incident.
Another U.S. intelligence official said that although Abdulmutallab said he had acted alone, there was evidence tying him to Al Qaeda's regional network of militants based in Osama bin Laden's ancestral home of Yemen.
"There is an association, but when you say [Al Qaeda] leaders, it's hard to say with certainty," the intelligence official said. "Who organized and who launched him? I can't give you a definitive judgment."
The official said that Abdulmutallab, an engineering student, had told his family in London in August that he wanted to go to Yemen to study; he reportedly had been there until earlier this month.
According to the intelligence official, Abdulmutallab said that he was trained in Yemen to make explosives that could escape detection -- and that militants had given him the materials for Friday's attempted attack.
In October, Al Qaeda's network in Yemen released the 11th edition of its official magazine. In it, top commander Abu Basir Wahishi advised supporters to use all available weapons to kill Westerners who were "apostates," or unbelievers. Two suggested venues: "in airports in the western crusade countries that participated in the war against Muslims; or on their planes."
A Yemeni official said Saturday that the Obama administration had formally requested his government's help in the investigation. "We are cooperating completely on this issue," said the official, adding that Yemen lacked sophisticated databases to track the thousands of students who make religious pilgrimages to the country every year.
"The whereabouts and exact details of what he did in Yemen are still unknown, but the investigation will clear up these things in the coming days," the official said.
According to the Justice Department, a judge informed Abdulmutallab of the charges against him during a hearing at the hospital.
Interviews with passengers and the crew of Flight 253 revealed that, before the incident, Abdulmutallab went to the bathroom for about 20 minutes and returned to his seat complaining of an upset stomach. He pulled a blanket over himself, and passengers heard popping noises similar to firecrackers, smelled an odor, and some observed his pants leg and the wall of the airplane on fire, an affidavit filed by FBI Special Agent Theodore James Peisig said.
Passengers and crew members then subdued Abdulmutallab and used blankets and fire extinguishers to put out the flames. "Passengers reported that Abdulmutallab was calm and lucid throughout. One flight attendant asked him what he had had in his pocket, and he replied, 'Explosive device,' " the affidavit said.
