Ellen Lockyer, KSKA – Anchorage
Information released Friday by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security indicates that Al Qaeda last year considered hijacking and detonating oil tankers in non Muslim seas to provoke an economic crisis in the West. The information comes from documents seized from Osama Bin Laden’s compound in Pakistan.
Speaking for the federal DHS, Matthew Chandler, says there is no specific or imminent threat, although he said officials didn’t know whether al Qaeda had continued the plotting since last year.
Jeremy Zidek, a spokesman for the Alaska Division of Homeland Security, says that the state “always maintains a high state of monitoring critical infrastructure,” and said the information comes from the federal level, not the state.
Chandler stressed that the information does not indicate the presence of an “imminent threat.” Intelligence gathered by American officials suggests the 2010 plans to target marine oil infrastructure were not fully formed.
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