US president Barack Obama emerged from Hawaiian seclusion on Monday to reassure the American public and quell gathering criticism as a branch of al Qaeda claimed responsibility for the thwarted attack on Christmas Day on an American passenger jet.
Obama vowed to track down “all who were involved” in helping a Nigerian man try to set off explosives aboard a Northwest Airlines flight as the plane approached Detroit, acknowledging the growing conclusion that the act was not that of a lone wolf but of a trained Qaeda operative.
On the international front, a group called Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, which operates in Yemen, asserted that it had sponsored the attempted attack in retaliation.
U.S. government officials said they considered the statement, which was posted on a jihadist website, credible.
Obama, making his first public comments since the episode, said he had ordered his national security team “to keep up the pressure” on terrorists and vowed to “use every element of our national power to disrupt, dismantle and defeat the violent extremists who threaten us, whether they are from Afghanistan or Pakistan, Yemen or Somalia, or anywhere where they are plotting attacks on the U.S. homeland.”
Obama’s appearance coincided with fresh evidence linking Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the 23-year-old Nigerian charged in the attempted attack, to Al Qaeda.
{{/usCountry}}Obama’s appearance coincided with fresh evidence linking Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the 23-year-old Nigerian charged in the attempted attack, to Al Qaeda.
{{/usCountry}}The statement by Al Qaeda on the Arabian Peninsula was accompanied by a photograph of Abdulmutallab.
Nigerian was in Yemen
Yemeni officials said immigration records showed Abdulmutallab was in their country from early August until early December.
The Yemeni embassy said in a statement that Abdulmutallab had previously studied Arabic in Yemen and applied to return this year to study.
Because he had a valid U.S. visa and “there was nothing suspicious about his intention to visit Yemen,” he was admitted, the statement said, adding that Yemeni authorities were working to “identify any other individuals who may be linked to him.”
The New York Times