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| Southeast Asia |
| Philippines Police Seize Bomb Materials |
| 2008-04-10 |
| (AP) — Police seized hundreds of components for making bombs in a raid on a suspected terrorist hide-out in the northern Philippines, officials said Wednesday. The target of Tuesday's raid in Laguna province's Alaminos town was Khalid Pagayao, a Filipino allegedly tied to the al-Qaida-linked Jemaah Islamiyah network and a plot to bomb Western embassies in the Philippines. However, he was not in the house at the time of the raid, Interior Secretary Ronaldo Puno said. Police recovered 550 pieces of improvised blasting caps, 25 pieces of time fuse, two detonating cords and an undetermined amount of Tetryl, an explosive compound. National police chief Avelino Razon said the raid was part of an investigation into recovered Arabic documents that revealed a plot to attack several Western embassies. Chief Superintendent Raul L. Castaneda, head of the police criminal investigation group, said Pagayao was wanted for his alleged involvement in the plot, which included plans to bomb the U.S., British, Australian and Israeli embassies in Manila. Castaneda said Pagayao's alleged role in the terrorist cell was not clear. The raid followed the deportation Tuesday of two Jordanian men allegedly involved in the plot. They were arrested by security forces in February. |
| Posted by:Fred |