Pakistanis among eight Islamic State ‘militants’ arrested in Saudi Arabia

Riyadh says the suspects were plotting killings and a car bombing

DUBAI: Saudi Arabia has arrested at least eight suspected militants, including two Pakistanis, for plotting killings and a car bombing, the country’s interior ministry said on Sunday, and authorities were pursuing other accomplices.

A ministry statement said those arrested included Islamic State suspects who had planned killings of security officials in the Shaqra district north of the capital Riyadh.



Other militants had planned to attack civilians in the eastern city of Qatif and stage a car bomb attack on a visiting United Arab Emirates (UAE) football team at a stadium in the western port city of Jeddah, the statement said. The statement said the eight arrested suspects included two Pakistanis, a Syrian and a Sudanese.

Eight Saudis and a Bahraini were among the suspects still at large, it said. Saudi security forces have grappled with sporadic attacks by adherents to the ultra-hardline Islamic State militant group, which is based in Iraq and Syria, and say they have arrested hundreds of its members. Local Saudi affiliates of IS have carried out several deadly shootings and bombings in the conservative kingdom.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 29^th, 2016.