JEDDAH – The Saudi Interior Ministry has revealed that the suicide bomber who blew himself up outside the US consulate in Jeddah, during an encounter with two security personnel, was of Pakistani origin.
Officials, using the social media platform Twitter, identified the bomber as Abdulah Gulzar Khan, a taxi driver who was born on 15/9/1981. He had reportedly been residing in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia along with his wife and her parents for the last 12 years.
Reacting to the Saudi claim, the Pakistani ambassador in Riyadh said: “Pakistan disowns every person who is involved in any sort of violence in Saudi Arabia.”
Later on, the Pakistani Chief of Army Staff General Raheel Sharif also telephoned Saudi Defense Minister Muhammad bin Salman and strongly condemned the multiple suicide blasts in the Kingdom.
Two security personnel were injured on Monday morning, while they were encountering a suicide bomber outside US consulate in Jeddah. Only the suicide bomber was killed in the incident.
On Monday, Saudi Arabia witnessed a total of three suicide bombings, first outside the US consulate in Jeddah, second in a mosque in Qatif and third near the Masjid-i-Nabvi in Madina. Five security officials died and several injured in the series of blasts.
On the other hand, the Kuwaiti government on Monday claimed that it had foiled at least three terror plots planned by the Islamic State militant group during pre-emptive nationwide raids, resulting in the arrest of several militants.
According to a statement issued by the Kuwaiti Interior Ministry, a Shiite mosque and a building of the ministry were among the intended targets of the arrested terrorists.
KUNA news agency also broadcast the pictures of a veiled woman and five young men – the alleged terrorists arrested by the forces. A Kuwaiti national was also among the militants, who had planned to execute their plots during the Eid holidays.
The arrests came as Middle East-based Islamic State claimed responsibility for several terrorist attacks including a cafe siege in Bangladesh and a car bomb blast in Baghdad.
Earlier in June, Iranian National Security Council Secretary Ali Shamkhani claimed to have thwarted several IS-planned bombings in Tehran and other cities.
Iran’s state-controlled news agency ISNA quoted Shamkhani as saying that a number of terror plots could have been executed in the coming days, had the planners and their facilitators not been arrested in a series of raids across the country.
