Terror threat clouds start of 9/11 ceremonies

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NEW YORK: Major US cities were on high alert Saturday as the nation began marking the poignant 10th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks amid warnings of a new Al-Qaeda linked terror threat.

Although details of the new suspected plot possibly involving car bombs in New York and Washington were sketchy, a US official told the threat was credible and somewhere between "aspirational" and a "boom."

According to The New York Times, word of the plot was passed to US intelligence officers by an informer based in the border region between Afghanistan and Pakistan on Wednesday.

The informer said two American citizens of Arab ancestry had left Afghanistan, traveled through one or more other countries and reached the United States as recently as last week, the report said.

But the informer's report included only a vague physical description of the two men, the paper said.

One plotter was described as five feet (1.5 meters) tall, the other five-foot eight (1.7 meters), and the first name for one was Suliman, which is common in the Middle East, The Times noted.

The informer also described a third conspirator, but he appeared to have traveled to Europe, the report said.

Former national security advisor Frances Townsend told CNN Friday that US spy networks had been alerted to a new threat after intercepting communications from a known, reliable operative in Pakistan.


President Barack Obama was briefed again Friday on the threat and repeated his order for security agencies to "redouble" efforts to take all necessary precautions, his spokesman Jay Carney said.

But there have been no changes to his plans to attend Sunday's ceremonies on at Ground Zero in New York, and Shanksville, Pennsylvania. A memorial to the victims of United Airlines Flight 93 who died in that Pennsylvania field will be unveiled in a solemn ceremony on Saturday.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano called on all Americans to remain vigilant and report anything suspicious, vowing to "protect the American people from an evolving threat picture both in the coming days and beyond."

Somber ceremonies began around the country Friday to mark the 10th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks as armed police patrolled New York streets and subways. (AFP)