WASHINGTON, Nov. 1 (UPI) -- Authorities were tipped to a package-bomb plot discovered last week by a former Guantanamo Bay detainee, a Yemeni security official said Monday.
The Wall Street Journal reported the crucial information came from Saudi national Jabir al-Fayfi, freed from the U.S. prison in Cuba in late 2006. The Journal said al-Fayfi had been released into Saudi custody and was placed in a Saudi re-education program where attempts are made to wean Islamic militants from violent jihad.
The newspaper said it was unclear whether al-Fayfi had infiltrated al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula as a planted agent or had rejoined the terrorist group before backing away.
Saudi officials didn't return calls seeking comment, the Journal said.
Citing two U.S. officials, The New York Times reported Monday that U.S. intelligence personnel who tracked a number of package shipments from Yemen to Chicago in September speculated the shipments might have been a test run for a terrorist attack. The intelligence officials now believe terrorists used the earlier shipments to plan the route and schedule for two printer cartridges packed with explosives sent from Yemen and intercepted in Britain and Dubai on Friday, the Times said.
Officials said Monday Yemen is tightening security at all of its airports following the plot to send parcel bombs to the United States.
"Every piece of cargo and luggage will go through extensive searching," the country's National Civil Aviation Security Committee said.
But Yemen needs "a lot of help" to fight al-Qaida, an aide to the country's prime minister told CNN.
"Al-Qaida has got a global sort of agenda, so you need global collaboration and regional collaboration," Mohammed Qubaty said.
One of Saudi Arabia's most-wanted criminals is believed to be part of the package-bomb plot discovered last week, officials said.
U.S. investigators said they believe Ibrahim Hassan al-Asiri, an al-Qaida bomb maker listed by the Saudi government as an expert in explosives and poison, is tied to packages containing explosives that authorities in the United Arab Emirates and Britain found Friday, CNN reported.
U.S. investigators said they believe al-Asiri, 28, was involved somehow in the packages in which investigators found the explosive PETN, similar to the material discovered in a failed bomb attack on a Christmas Day 2009 flight as it was approaching Detroit. Al-Asiri also was suspected in that attempt.
U.S. officials said they believe the latest plot originated in Yemen and was conceived by al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, an al-Qaida offshoot. During the weekend, Yemeni authorities detained a woman suspected of having a role in the plot, but later released her.
In London, Prime Minister David Cameron will head a meeting of the government's emergency planning committee. Officials called for a review of airport security after one of the bombs was discovered on a cargo plane at the East Midlands airport, the BBC reported.
Despite their belief al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula was behind the plot, U.S. and Yemeni officials said they don't have a lot of hard evidence about who was involved, The New York Times reported.
In appearances on Sunday television talk shows, President Obama's counter-terrorism adviser, John O. Brennan, said U.S. and British authorities were leaning toward believing the packages were meant to detonate in flight.
