Nigerian terrorists' Links to Ghana

Federal authorities on Saturday charged a 23-year-old Nigerian man, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab , with trying to blow up a Detroit-bound airliner on Christmas Day, and officials said the suspect told them he had obtained explosive chemicals and a syringe that were sewn into his underwear from a bomb expert in Yemen associated with Al Qaeda.

Abdulmutallab appeared to have chosen his seat on Northwest Airlines Flight 253 carefully. The Christmas Day seat in aisle 19 placed him right over the fuel tanks of the jetliner and at the window, where an explosion would have maximum effect, US security experts told US broadcasters.

The Nigerian terrorist suspect spent 20 minutes in the bathroom as the plane entered its descent pattern into the Detroit, Michigan airport.

Then he returned to his seat complaining of a stomach ache, covered his lap with a blanket and ignited the PETN explosive strapped somewhere between his legs with a fluid injection, US justice officials indicated Saturday.

All was apparently going according to plan.

But Abdulmutallab had not reckoned with the quick-thinking response of a fellow passenger, Jasper Schuringa, a video director from Holland.

The minute the Dutch man heard the firecracker-type popping, smelled the smoke and saw the fire coming from one row ahead of him, on the opposite side of the plane, Schuringa leapt over seats and passengers to get to the source.

Links to Ghana

• Mr Abdulmutallab's route began in Yemen, from where he travelled to Ethiopia, Ghana and Nigeria. On 24 December, he flew from Lagos to Amsterdam, where he boarded the flight to Detroit.

• (BBC) Mr. Muttalab is 23 years old and the son of the former chairman of First Bank of Nigeria, Umaru Abdul Mutallab, who is now chairman of Jaiz International Plc, an Islamic bank. The family owns homes in London, Ghana and Nigeria, with the now-alleged bomber living in a basement flat in a mansion block near Harley Street in Central London.

• ... the ticket information of Abdulmutallab showed that the e-ticket with which he traveled was purchased from KLM airport office in Accra, Ghana on December 16, 2009 and with USD 2, 831 the ticket was paid for in cash. Demuren said the original routing of the trip was Lagos-Amsterdam-Detroit-Amsterdam-Accra.

  “However, the routing was later changed to Lagos-Amsterdam-Detroit-Amsterdam-Lagos,” the Director-General said. He said the return journey of Abdulmutallab was booked for January 8, 2010 out of Detroit, to arrive Lagos January 9, 2010

• Charles Anaman, 26, who now lives in Ghana, said that he was close friends with Mr. Abdulmutallab in high school — they would listen to music, watch videos, play basketball.
  Mr. Abdulmutallab was like most other students at the school, Mr. Anaman said, with a particular interest in studying history, and a preference for hip-hop music.
  Mr. Anaman said that his involvement in the Detroit incident was hard to imagine: “He was a very calm person.”