- KHOBAR -- As many as 16 oil
workers were massacred yesterday by suspected Islamic terrorists in Saudi
Arabia, who last night were still holding a further 50 foreign workers
hostage at gunpoint.
-
- The militants - who are believed to be linked to al-Qaeda
- stormed the luxury apartment block in the city of Khobar, spraying gunfire
at several buildings, killing at least nine Saudis and seven foreigners,
including one Briton, who was an employee for the Saudi company Apicorp.
-
- Reports last night claimed the Briton's body was tied
to a car and dragged for two kilometres before being dumped near a bridge.
-
- It is believed those who died in the initial assault
on the compound included one American, two Filipinos, an Indian, a Pakistani
and an Egyptian boy of 10, as well as two Saudi civilians and seven security
force members. The gunmen then took control of the building and were last
night using their hostages as human shields as protection against the police.
-
- The incident began when four gunmen in military dress
burst into the expatriate Oasis and Rami compounds for the oil industry
in Khobar, which has security guards on 24-hour duty, using a small car
and a 4x4. They began firing indiscriminately.
-
- In running gun battles, Saudi forces stormed the five-star
Oasis compound, about 250 miles east of Riyadh, but were beaten back by
grenades.
-
- Security forces said the militants, who had freed all
Muslims but still held around 50 hostages, mainly Westerners, including
Americans, Italians and those Arabs who were Christians, were surrounded
on the sixth floor of a high-rise building.
-
- However, Saudi police said last night that the terrorists
were using the hostages as human shields and that officials were trying
to negotiate.
-
- "Security forces are worried about storming because
the gunmen have grenades," one policeman said.
-
- "Ambulances have been going in and out of the compound
all day and we have been hearing lots of gunfire," said witness Mohammed
Sweidan.
-
- A US embassy official added: "I can confirm the
death of at least one American. There may be more."
-
- A statement, purportedly from Saudi-born Osama bin Laden's
al-Qaeda network, was posted on Islamist websites, claiming responsibility
for the attacks on what it called companies which specialised in "looting
and stealing the wealth of the Muslims" and for the killing of "a
number of crusaders, God's enemies". The group, blamed for the September
2001 attacks on the United States, has vowed to destabilise the US-allied
monarchy, which is the world's leading oil exporter.
-
- It is the third such attack on foreigners in less than
a month in the birthplace of Islam. It appeared aimed at the crucial oil
industry, which is partly Western-run. Arabic TV news network Al Arabiya
aired footage of a man with Western features, slumped in his car, apparently
shot dead by the gunmen. It showed a charred car and a third blood-spattered
vehicle.
-
- Militants opened fire at the Al-Khobar Petroleum Centre
building, believed to house offices of major Western oil firms, before
storming into a complex housing oil services offices and homes of employees,
security sources said. They also entered the Oasis housing compound, where
they took a number of hostages including five Lebanese nationals. Lebanon
later said its citizens had been released.
-
- Employees of Shell, Honeywell and General Electric lived
in the compound that was attacked. The Oasis residence has housed executives
from oil majors Royal Dutch/Shell, Total and Lukoil.
-
- "People are terrified," a Lebanese woman who
lives in Khobar said. "Nobody knows what is happening or how many
were killed."
-
- The attack came two days after the al-Qaeda leader in
the kingdom, Abdulaziz al-Muqrin, issued a battle plan for urban guerrilla
war, specifying steps militants needed to take to topple the royal family.
-
- Earlier this month militants killed five foreigners in
an unprecedented attack on a petrochemical site in Saudi Arabia's Red Sea
town of Yanbu and dragged the body of an American through the streets.
-
- Muqrin claimed responsibility for that attack and vowed
more in Saudi Arabia and other Muslim states. A German was shot dead this
month in a shopping district in eastern Riyadh.
-
- Oil markets have been on edge over the possibility of
a strike on oil facilities in the kingdom, the world's biggest crude exporter,
that would disrupt supplies.
-
- The attack in the main Saudi oil-producing region came
a week after Saudi Arabia pledged to hike oil output to stabilise spiralling
prices, and ahead of an Opec meeting next week.
-
- Saudi security forces have arrested or gunned down at
least eight of the country's 26 most wanted militants, but their defiance
of the crackdown has raised questions about security.
-
- De facto Saudi ruler Crown Prince Abdullah has pledged
to hunt down militants for "decades" if needed. "They seek
nothing but destruction, corruption and instability," he said.
-
- The US embassy has reiterated its call to US citizens
to leave Saudi Arabia, while Britain repeated a warning to its citizens
to avoid all but essential travel there.
-
- ©2004 Scotsman.com http://news.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=614672004
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