Turkey: NATO bomb plot disrupted

ANKARA, Turkey - A Turkish court on Monday charged nine suspected members of a group linked to al-Qaida in a plot to set off a bomb at a NATO summit in Istanbul next month that President Bush is scheduled to attend.

Private CNN-Turk television said three of the suspects had been plotting a suicide attack on Bush and other Western leaders at the summit, but officials could not confirm the report.

Authorities detained 16 alleged members of Ansar al-Islam on Thursday in the northwestern province of Bursa, Gov. Oguz Kagan Koksal said. The suspects also planned to attack a synagogue in Bursa and rob a bank to raise funds, Koksal said.

A separate group in northern Iraq also uses the name Ansar al-Islam. A police official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the two groups share ideology and tactics.

A Turkish court that deals with terrorism cases charged the nine with "membership in an illegal organization." Conviction on the charge carries a sentence of up to 10 years in prison.

Prosecutors earlier released the other seven suspects after questioning them. It was not clear if they could still face charges. No trial date has been set.

Nine others were questioned in Istanbul but also were released, officials said.

The crackdown on the group comes amid heightened security before the June 28-29 meeting of NATO alliance leaders; a series of bombings struck Istanbul in November.

More than 60 people were killed when members of a Turkish al-Qaida cell bombed two synagogues, a London-based bank and the British Consulate. Turkish officials have charged 69 suspects in the bombings. Their trial starts this month.

Istanbul, which will also host a European song contest this month and a meeting of foreign ministers from Islamic countries in June, is safe, said Gov. Muammer Guler.

The Ansar al-Islam suspects appeared Monday in a court in Bursa, where they also could face charges of possession of explosives, violating gun laws and holding fake identity documents. They were caught after yearlong police surveillance, Koksal said.

The group's leader, identified as Alpaslan Toprak, was among those detained, he said. Local TV showed him being escorted by police, grinning.

CNN-Turk said one of the suspects had been trained at a camp in Pakistan, where he stayed for six years.

Koksal said police also seized equipment to make remote-controlled bombs, guns, books on bombmaking, forged identity documents and CDs that served as training manuals.

Some of the suspects surveyed the site of a synagogue in Bursa as well as that of a bank, Koksal said. He said the suspects planned to flee to Iraq to fight U.S. troops once they had carried out a major attack in Turkey.

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