US faces new threat on 10th year of 9/11

NEW YORK—Heavily armed police were on alert in and around New York City on Friday after US officials warned of a “credible” but unconfirmed bomb threat on the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

“There is specific, credible but unconfirmed threat information,” a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security, Matt Chandler, said, as the White House confirmed President Barack Obama had ordered boosted counterterrorism efforts.

“We have taken, and will continue to take all steps necessary to mitigate any threats that arise,” the department added in a statement.

A White House official confirmed that President Obama had “directed the counterterrorism community to redouble its efforts in response to this credible but unconfirmed information.”

Federal officials in Washington, speaking on condition of anonymity, said counterterrorism officials were assessing a report about the threat of an attack in New York City or Washington using a car or truck bomb and timed to the 10th anniversary of the September 11 attacks.

Another official said US intelligence agencies were urgently pursuing leads overseas in an effort to gauge the seriousness of the threat.

Few details were given, but one US official said a car bomb was “at the top of what we would be looking for.”

“There’s enough information that’s specific and credible that you have to run it to ground,” the official said, adding: “I would stress that this is unconfirmed.”

One law enforcement official said the initial intelligence report said that at least three suspects in a reported plot, one of them an American citizen, left Afghanistan and entered the United States by air last month. Intelligence agencies have not confirmed the report or identified those involved, the official said.

Osama’s notebook

The report of the threat came after several quiet weeks in which officials said they were scanning intelligence with extra vigilance before the anniversary, but had found nothing credible.

Chandler noted that in a notebook seized after Osama bin Laden was killed, the al-Qaida leader speculated about mounting an attack 10 years after September 11 or on another symbolic date.

Although there was no immediate change to the official national threat level, New York authorities immediately announced sweeping extra measures, including vehicle checkpoints.

The police department “is deploying additional resources… some of which you will notice and some of which you will not,” Mayor Michael Bloomberg told reporters.

“The best thing we can do to fight terror is to not let it intimidate us,” Bloomberg said, adding that he planned to take the subway in the morning as usual. “I can tell you our ceremonies will go on over the weekend exactly as they were planned,” the mayor said, referring to the memorial events for the 10th anniversary.

City police commissioner Raymond Kelly told the press conference that measures included police “trained in heavy weapons positioned outside of Manhattan to respond citywide.”

Extra shift hours would effectively increase by a third the size of patrols around New York, with checks on ferries, tunnels, bridges and landmarks, Kelly said.

Towing suspicious cars

There would be increased towing of illegally parked cars and more bomb detection sweeps in car parks, as well as “increasing the number of bag inspections on the subway,” Kelly said.

Earlier, US military bases had raised their alert levels, but officials would not say whether this was related to the new threat report.

The scare came days ahead of Sunday’s anniversary ceremonies for the 9/11 attacks, when Obama and his predecessor George W. Bush are due in the city, along with large crowds.

Despite frequent threats and a string of failed plots, al-Qaida has not succeeded in mounting a major attack on US soil since 2001, when it hijacked passenger planes and crashed them into New York’s World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a Pennsylvania field, killing nearly 3,000 people.

However, officials have warned of a possible backlash following the US commando operation in May that killed Bin Laden in a secret compound in Pakistan.  Reports from AFP and New York Times News Service

First posted 11:48 pm | Friday, September 9th, 2011