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Turk Police Foil Bomb Plot Aimed at NATO Summit
May 3 — By Gareth Jones
ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkish police said Monday they had foiled a bomb plot targeting a NATO summit in Istanbul at the end of June which is to be attended by President Bush and other Western leaders.
Police arrested a total of 24 people they said belonged to a militant Islamist group called Ansar al-Islam, 16 of them in the town of Bursa 250 km (160 miles) south of Istanbul. The other eight were held in Istanbul.
The police said they had also seized guns, explosives, bomb-making booklets and 4,000 compact discs featuring training instructions from al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.
Turkish security has been stepped up since four devastating suicide truck bomb attacks in Istanbul last November that killed 61 people. Al Qaeda claimed responsibility for the attacks which targeted British and Jewish sites.
Ansar al-Islam is a militant group from Kurdish northern Iraq accused by Washington of being an ally of al Qaeda and a force behind attacks on U.S. troops occupying Iraq.
"After a successful operation the organization planning this attack has been destroyed. This is the result of a year-long operation," Bursa governor Oguz Kagan Koksal said in a statement carried by the state Anatolian news agency. Koksal said Ansar al-Islam had planned to carry out more attacks on U.S. troops in Iraq after the June 28-29 NATO summit. NTV television said some of those held had already taken part in the insurgency in Iraq. A NATO spokeswoman said the alliance was not reconsidering its plan to hold the summit in Istanbul." At the moment there is no consideration of that," she said. "The Turkish authorities are responsible for security and we have confidence in them."
SECURITY CONCERNS
The men arrested had also been plotting an attack on a synagogue in Bursa as well as a bank robbery in the same town to raise funds for their operations, Koksal said.
The men had been found to hold fake identity cards. They had also been involved in the manufacture of fake software including PC games to raise money, Koksal said.
Turkish television showed pictures of timing devices, guns and explosive materials seized by the police in Bursa.
Police have been stepping up security in Istanbul, Turkey's largest city and commercial hub, before the NATO summit, where Iraq will feature on the agenda.
The summit will also formally welcome seven new members from ex-communist central and eastern Europe into the alliance.
Since the November truck bombings, Istanbul has witnessed several other much smaller attacks, the most serious of which targeted a Masonic lodge and killed a waiter and one of two suicide bombers.
Turkey, the only predominantly Muslim member of NATO, is viewed as a prime target for militant Islamist groups because of its secular democracy and its close security ties with the United States and Israel.
Last autumn, Turkey agreed to send peacekeeping troops to Iraq to help its U.S. ally, but later withdrew the offer after meeting strong resistance from members of Iraq's U.S.-appointed Governing Council.
May 3 — By Gareth Jones
ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkish police said Monday they had foiled a bomb plot targeting a NATO summit in Istanbul at the end of June which is to be attended by President Bush and other Western leaders.
Police arrested a total of 24 people they said belonged to a militant Islamist group called Ansar al-Islam, 16 of them in the town of Bursa 250 km (160 miles) south of Istanbul. The other eight were held in Istanbul.
The police said they had also seized guns, explosives, bomb-making booklets and 4,000 compact discs featuring training instructions from al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.
Turkish security has been stepped up since four devastating suicide truck bomb attacks in Istanbul last November that killed 61 people. Al Qaeda claimed responsibility for the attacks which targeted British and Jewish sites.
Ansar al-Islam is a militant group from Kurdish northern Iraq accused by Washington of being an ally of al Qaeda and a force behind attacks on U.S. troops occupying Iraq.
"After a successful operation the organization planning this attack has been destroyed. This is the result of a year-long operation," Bursa governor Oguz Kagan Koksal said in a statement carried by the state Anatolian news agency. Koksal said Ansar al-Islam had planned to carry out more attacks on U.S. troops in Iraq after the June 28-29 NATO summit. NTV television said some of those held had already taken part in the insurgency in Iraq. A NATO spokeswoman said the alliance was not reconsidering its plan to hold the summit in Istanbul." At the moment there is no consideration of that," she said. "The Turkish authorities are responsible for security and we have confidence in them."
SECURITY CONCERNS
The men arrested had also been plotting an attack on a synagogue in Bursa as well as a bank robbery in the same town to raise funds for their operations, Koksal said.
The men had been found to hold fake identity cards. They had also been involved in the manufacture of fake software including PC games to raise money, Koksal said.
Turkish television showed pictures of timing devices, guns and explosive materials seized by the police in Bursa.
Police have been stepping up security in Istanbul, Turkey's largest city and commercial hub, before the NATO summit, where Iraq will feature on the agenda.
The summit will also formally welcome seven new members from ex-communist central and eastern Europe into the alliance.
Since the November truck bombings, Istanbul has witnessed several other much smaller attacks, the most serious of which targeted a Masonic lodge and killed a waiter and one of two suicide bombers.
Turkey, the only predominantly Muslim member of NATO, is viewed as a prime target for militant Islamist groups because of its secular democracy and its close security ties with the United States and Israel.
Last autumn, Turkey agreed to send peacekeeping troops to Iraq to help its U.S. ally, but later withdrew the offer after meeting strong resistance from members of Iraq's U.S.-appointed Governing Council.