Kuwaiti security forces arrested six Kuwaitis linked to al Qaeda who planned to attack a U.S. military installation, the country’s state-run news agency reported Tuesday.
The suspects had planned to bomb Camp Arifjan during the upcoming Muslim holy month of Ramadan, Kuwaiti security sources said. It is unclear when the arrests took place. The plot also involved an attack on Kuwait’s State Security Service headquarters and other government facilities, according to the Kuwait News Agency, which cited a statement from the Interior Ministry. An investigation into the alleged plot linked to al Qaeda is ongoing, the news agency reported. Two suspects confessed Tuesday that they planned to attack Camp Arifjan with an explosives-laden truck during Ramadan, which begins August 21, the security sources said. The other four suspects will be interrogated Wednesday, the sources said. Pentagon and U.S. military officials had no information about the reported plot on Camp Arifjan, the forward headquarters for the U.S. Army Central Command in the region. It is a major logistics base for the U.S. military and generally houses thousands of American troops. “We take the security situation at the base and force protection very seriously and coordinate closely with the Kuwaiti government on the security of our bases,” said Army Sgt. Major Brian Thomas, an Atlanta, Georgia-based spokesman for the region’s Central Command. “Camp Arifjan and other bases in Kuwait are very secure. The security at Camp Arifjan is no different than the security at any U.S. base in Iraq or Afghanistan.” The U.S. military had no information on the reported plot. “The operation was a Kuwaiti-led one, and so the Kuwaitis have the details on the intel and the people they apprehended,” said Navy Capt. Jack Hanzlik, a spokesman for U.S. Central Command.
