New video shows underwear bomber in target practice: ABC
AFP
WASHINGTON- New videos produced by Al-Qaeda in Yemen show accused underwear bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab and others in firing practice taking aim at a Jewish star, a British flag and the letters UN, ABC television reported Monday.
The footage, set to air on ABC's US evening news, "also includes an apparent martyrdom statement in Arabic from the 23-year-old Nigerian justifying his actions against 'the Jews and the Christians and their agents,'" the network said in a statement.
Undated family photograph of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab
Abdulmutallab "says, 'the enemy is in your lands with their armies, the Jews and the Christians and their agents.' He reads several passages from the Koran and adds, 'God said those who punish you must be punished,'" ABC reported.
The videos obtained by a Yemeni journalist working for ABC News appear to support Abdulmutallab's statements to the FBI after his arrest that 'others like me' in Yemen were training to carry out attacks against western targets.
Earlier this month chief federal defender Miriam Siefer declined to comment when asked by reporters about a potential plea deal or the extent to which Abdulmutallab is cooperating with government officials.
Abdulmutallab pleaded not guilty in January to six terrorism related charges, including attempted murder of 290 people on board the plane and trying to use a weapon of mass destruction.
He faces a maximum penalty of life imprisonment if convicted.
The son of a prominent Nigerian banker, Abdulmutallab allegedly had explosives stitched into his underwear, which failed to detonate aboard the Northwest flight from Amsterdam to Detroit.
It was passengers and crew not US intelligence that thwarted the attack, tackling and restraining Abdulmutallab before he was escorted off the plane.
The foiled bombing triggered global alarm, leading the United States to adopt stringent new screening and security measures at airports around the world.
Probes revealed that US analysts knew Abdulmutallab was an extremist and that Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula was plotting an attack, but did not connect the information.
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