MOMBASA - The United States says there is increasing reason to believe al Qaeda was involved in last week's twin attacks on Israelis in Kenya, where reports suggested authorities received bomb warnings months ago.
A missile launcher used in a failed attack on an Israeli airliner has been linked to al Qaeda, a US official said yesterday.
Washington also believed an internet statement purporting to be from the group claiming it carried out the assaults was credible.
A suicide bombing killed the three bombers, three Israelis and 10 Kenyans at an Israeli-owned hotel in the coastal resort of Mombasa on Thursday. An almost simultaneous missile attack narrowly missed an Israeli airliner taking off nearby.
It was the African country's bloodiest terror attack since 1998, when 224 people died in embassy bombings widely thought to be the work of guerrillas linked to Osama bin Laden.
"The fighters of al Qaeda return to the same place where the Crusader-Jewish coalition was hit four years ago," said the statement posted on the internet.
In Washington, a US official said the statement, signed by the "Political Office of Qaeda al-Jihad" and posted on an Islamist Web site, was being viewed as credible. He said there was increasing reason to believe that al Qaeda was involved.
The official, who spoke anonymously, also said the serial number on the missile fired in the Kenyan attack was close in sequence to a missile fired at a US military aircraft in Saudi Arabia in May, suggesting it came from the same batch.
Kenyan President Daniel arap Moi headed to Washington yesterday for talks with President George W. Bush, who has pledged US help to track down the perpetrators.
Kenya's Daily Nation newspaper, citing unnamed sources, said yesterday that police, Army and intelligence officials had received warnings of a possible attack as early as March.
In other developments in the "war on terror":
* Britain plans to vaccinate key military and health service workers against smallpox as a precaution against any terror attack with the deadly virus.
Denying it had any specific information of a smallpox attack, the Government said it would vaccinate 350 health specialists as well as selected members of the armed forces likely to be in the front line of any biological attack.
It was also starting a tender for more of the vaccine so it can stock enough for the whole population.
* Lawyers for two Australians, two Britons and 12 Kuwaitis held by the US military at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, yesterday urged an appeals court to allow them to go to court to fight for basic detainees' rights such as seeing a lawyer and their families.
Lawyers from rights groups representing the detainees argued that the Constitution and international law forbade indefinite detention without allowing the prisoners certain protection.
- AGENCIES
Story archives:
Links: War against terrorism
Timeline: Major events since the Sept 11 attacks
Clues point to al Qaeda role in Kenyan attack
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