A Saudi bombmaker believed behind several failed but ingenious attempted attacks on the West is the most likely creator of an improved "underwear bomb" discovered in a plot foiled by U.S. and allied authorities, security experts and officials say.
Ibrahim Hassan al-Asiri, who once provided the bomb for a suicide mission by his younger brother, a fellow militant, is described by security officials as one of the most dangerous and innovative explosives experts ever to serve al Qaeda.
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Believed to be in his early 30s, Yemen-based Asiri became an urgent priority for Western counter-terrorism officials following his alleged role in planning strikes on the United States in 2009 and 2010, plots that included the failed bombing of an airliner over Detroit on Christmas Day in 2009.
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Asiri, who survived a U.S. drone missile attack last year, has drawn scrutiny for his skill at fashioning bombs using a hard-to-detect powdery substance called pentaerythritol tetranitrate, or PETN, and hiding them in clothing or equipment.
"If we assume Asiri is behind all these attacks, then he is at the top of the list of the most dangerous al Qaeda operatives," Mustafa Alani, a Gulf security expert with good Saudi contacts, told Reuters.
Richard Barrett, who heads the al Qaeda-Taliban sanctions monitoring committee at the United Nations, said he was "pretty certain" Asiri was the top suspect in the latest plot.
"He has a particular skill for making things which are effective without being detectable," he said. "This example looks like an evolution from the one he gave the Christmas Day bomber ... and so I think it is likely to have been his."
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The Obama administration said on Monday that authorities in the Middle East recently seized an underwear bomb which they believe al Qaeda's Yemen-based affiliate, al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula AQAP.L, had intended to give to a suicide bomber to blow up an airliner bound for the U.S. or another Western country.
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