Senior Al-Qaeda militant arrested at Cairo airport, say Egypt officials

FILE | AFP Rescuers help survivors after a bomb explosion in one of Al-Qaeda’s attacks near the United States embassy and a bank in Nairobi on August 7, 1998. The blast killed 212 people, including eight Americans, and left more than 1,000 people injured.

A suspected mastermind of the US embassy bombing in Nairobi 13 years ago has been arrested at the Cairo airport, Egyptian security officials claimed on Wednesday.Unconfirmed reports, however, seemed to cast doubts into the man’s identity.Saif al-Adel arrived in the Egyptian capital on a flight from Pakistan, media reports quoted the security chiefs.At the time of the US embassy bombing on August 7, 1998, Adel was serving as a top security adviser of Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, who was killed by US troops in Pakistan in May last year.He was one of the terror group’s leaders placed on the FBI wanted list for their role in the embassy bombing which left 212 people dead and over 4,000 injured.Officials told state media they knew he was intending to hand himself in, and that his real name, Mohammed Ibrahim Makkawi, was on the passenger list.He was also suspected of training Somali fighters who killed 18 US servicemen in Mogadishu in 1993, and some of the 11 September 2001 hijackers.The US has offered a $5m reward for information leading to his capture or death.Security officials told the Egyptian state news agency Mena that Adel was detained at Cairo International Airport as he arrived on Wednesday, after flying to Egypt from Pakistan via Dubai.The officials said they had received information about his plans to return to Egypt and hand himself over to the authorities.All flights from Asia were monitored as he was expected to come from either Afghanistan or Pakistan, and eventually his name was spotted on the passenger list of an Emirates Airline flight, they added.Adel was handed over to the Higher State Security Prosecution for interrogation. Mena did not say where is being held.However, the Associated Press reports that a man identifying himself as Mohammed Ibrahim Makkawi told journalists at the airport that he was not the senior Al-Qaeda leader known as Saif al-Adel.Adel, a former special forces commander, who is in his 50s, first travelled to Afghanistan in the 1980s to fight Soviet forces with the mujahideen.He has been wanted by the Egyptian authorities since 1987, when he was accused of trying to establish a military wing of the Egyptian Islamist group al-Jihad, and trying to overthrow the government. Adel later joined Al-Qaeda and became Osama Bin Laden’s security chief. He assumed many of military commander Mohammed Atef’s duties after his death in a US air strike in November 2001.Following the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, Adel is believed to have fled to Iran with Saad bin Laden, a son of the late Al-Qaeda leader.They were allegedly then held under house arrest by the Revolutionary Guards, although Iran never acknowledged their presence. Several letters and internet statements bearing Adel’s name or aliases were subsequently released, leading analysts to believe he was still in contact with Al-Qaeda’s leaders in the region.

Recent reports said Adel might have been released and made his way to northern Pakistan, along with Saad bin Laden.There was also speculation that he was appointed temporary leader of Al-Qaeda after Osama Bin Laden was killed in a raid by US special forces on a compound in the north-western Pakistani city of Abbot taad last May.State television’s Channel One and the official MENA news agency also reported his arrest. The news agency quoted airport officials as saying that security had received information that Adel intended to return to Egypt and was monitoring flights for his arrival.

al-Qaeda Leader Saif al-Adel Arrested in Egypt (updated/bumped)