American’s kidnappers had help

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia – Police cars and armored vehicles flooded the al-Malaz neighborhood in the Saudi capital Sunday as security forces surrounded a house where suspected militants were believed to have taken refuge after a shootout with police.

The massive operation was under way in the same district that was the focus of a huge security sweep against militants sought in the beheading of American hostage Paul M. Johnson Jr., whose body has still not been found.

Johnson’s kidnappers had help from sympathizers within the Saudi security forces, according to an account of the operation posted by an al Qaeda cell on an Islamic extremist Web site Sunday. The sympathizers gave police uniforms to the militants, who then snatched the American engineer at a fake checkpoint in the city, the posting said.

The account highlighted fears some diplomats and Westerners in the kingdom have expressed – that militants have infiltrated Saudi security forces, a possibility Saudi officials have denied.

Saudi King Fahd vowed that militants in the kingdom would be stopped.

“The perpetrators of these attacks aimed at shaking stability and crippling security – and it is a far-fetched aim, God willing,” he said in a speech Sunday to the advisory Shura Council. “We will not allow this destructive bunch, led by deviant thought, to harm the security of this nation or affect its stability.”

Police barricaded the al-Malaz district in Riyadh, where security forces were surrounding the house. Witnesses told the Associated Press that they saw shooting between suspects and police before some men fled on foot, seeking refuge in the building.

It was the same area where Abdulaziz al-Moqrin, believed to be the leader of al Qaeda in Saudi Arabia, and three other militants were killed in a shootout with Saudi security forces on Friday, hours after their cell killed Johnson and posted photos of his body and severed head on a Web site.

The foreign affairs adviser of Crown Prince Abdullah in Washington, Adel al-Jubeir, said Saudi officials were still looking for Johnson’s body. “We are still combing through neighborhoods. And we hope that eventually we’ll find the body and restore it to his family,” he told CNN’s “Late Edition.”

According to the account of Johnson’s kidnapping, militants wearing police uniforms and using police cars set up a fake checkpoint June 12 on al-Khadma Road, leading to the airport, near Imam Mohammed bin Saud University.

“A number of the cooperators who are sincere to their religion in the security apparatus donated those clothes and the police cars. We ask God to reward them and that they use their energy to serve Islam and the mujahedeen,” the article read.

When Johnson’s car approached the checkpoint, the militants stopped his car, anesthetized him and carried him to another vehicle, the article said. Earlier Saudi newspaper reports also said Johnson was drugged during the kidnapping.

The article said they then blew up Johnson’s car.

Security officials said last week that Johnson’s car was found near Imam University. Saudi press reports said the car was booby-trapped and later caught fire.

In a separate article on the Web site, al-Moqrin justified the killing of Johnson, pointing to his work on Apache attack helicopters for Lockheed Martin.

Johnson “works for military aviation and he belongs to the American army, which kills, tortures and harms Muslims everywhere, which supports enemies (of Islam) in Palestine, Philippines, Kashmir,” al-Moqrin wrote.

The same day Johnson was seized, Islamic militants shot and killed another American, Kenneth Scroggs of Laconia, N.H., in his garage in Riyadh. Earlier that week, militants in the capital shot and killed Irish cameraman Simon Cumbers, who was filming for the British Broadcasting Corp. when he was shot, and another American, Robert Jacobs of Murphysboro, Ill.

After the kidnapping, Johnson’s captors said they would kill him on Friday unless Saudi Arabia released jailed al Qaeda militants – a demand the Saudi government refused.

Sunday’s al Qaeda article said the militants decided to behead Johnson when al-Jubeir declared that Saudi Arabia would not negotiate with the kidnappers.