Reuters says U.S. officials told them they don't think there are nine Americans among those detained in Saudi Arabia on suspicion of terrorism:
U.S. officials said on Sunday they did not believe nine U.S. citizens were among 33 suspects detained on terrorism charges in Saudi Arabia over the past week, as reported by a Saudi newspaper.
The English-language daily Saudi Gazette, citing an unnamed source, on Sunday reported that four Americans were detained last Monday, followed by another five in the following days. Saudi authorities also detained 14 Saudis, three Yemenis, two Syrians, an Indonesian, a Filipino, a United Arab Emirates citizen, a Palestinian and a citizen of Kazakhstan, the report said.
Six U.S. officials told Reuters that the U.S. government could not confirm that any Americans were among the 33 suspects detained.
However, two officials said U.S. authorities were still checking names against databases. Saudi authorities were also investigating the citizenship of those detained, one of the officials said.
None of the U.S. officials was authorized to speak publicly, and the U.S. embassy did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Saudi Arabia in 2014 declared Islamic State a terrorist organisation and has detained hundreds of its supporters. The group, which controls territory in Iraq and Syria, has staged a series of attacks in the kingdom.
On Friday an attack at a Shi'ite Muslim mosque in Saudi Arabia's al-Ahsa district in Eastern Province killed four people and injured 18, the latest in a string of attacks claimed by Sunni jihadists that have left over 50 dead in the past year.
The website of the Interior Ministry's militant rehabilitation centre listed four U.S. citizens as having been detained on Jan. 25 and four more over the previous three months. It did not list any more recent detentions.
An AP report:
Greek police say they have arrested two men suspected of possessing weapons and attempting to travel to Syria to join the Islamic State group.
One of those arrested was a 29-year-old Serbia-born Swedish citizen who was released from prison in 2011 after serving six years for possessing explosives and threatening to carry out an attack, a police officer told The Associated Press on Sunday. The man had been arrested and convicted in Bosnia before he was transferred to serve the last part of his sentence in Sweden.
He was arrested again Thursday near the Greek-Turkish border along with a 20-year-old man originally from Yemen. Both were traveling on Swedish passports and Greek police said they found two long knives, a rifle holster and military uniforms in their luggage.
The police officer, who demanded anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak about an ongoing investigation, said they are believed to have been on their way from Sweden to Syria. They had left Sweden by car and then flew from Copenhagen to Athens. After that, they traveled by bus to Thessaloniki and then to the northeastern city of Alexandroupolis, where they were arrested while trying to find local transport to the Turkish border, which they planned to cross on foot.
An official police statement said the two were arrested during a routine inspection, but the officer told the AP they had been tracked throughout their journey.
Sweden's Foreign Ministry confirmed that two Swedish citizens had been detained in Greece but gave no other details.
Sweden's security police are "aware" of the arrest, but haven't been cooperating with Greek security officials on the case, Swedish security police spokeswoman Sirpa Franzen told the AP, without providing further details.
The two suspects will appear before a magistrate on Tuesday.
An abridged report from AFP:
International pressure mounted Sunday on Libya to form a national unity government as the Islamic State jihadist group expands at the doorstep of Europe and the rest of Africa.
In Libya itself, prime minister-designate Fayez al-Sarraj met controversial army chief General Khalifa Haftar as part of a series of encounters to press the creation of a UN-backed unity cabinet.
The meeting came as African Union leaders at a summit in Addis Ababa called for a political solution in Libya to curb the spread of IS.
In Paris, French Defence Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said IS could infiltrate the ranks of refugees using Libya as a springboard to reach Europe, adding that a unity government ould help "eradicate" IS.
Libya has been in political turmoil and rocked by violence since the 2011 toppling of longtime dictator Moamer Kadhafi.
Since the summer of 2014, the country has had two rival administrations, with the recognised authorities based in the country's far east and a militia-backed authority in Tripoli.
The situation has been further compromised with the emergence of IS in the oil-rich North African country and a brisk business by people smugglers ferrying migrants to Europe.
The jihadist group, which controls swathes of territory in Syria and Iraq, has claimed several attacks and beheadings in Libya and last year captured the coastal city of Sirte.
In January, IS jihadist pushed east from Sirte in an attempt to seize oil terminals in Ras Lanuf and Al-Sidra, which lie in an "oil crescent" along the northern coast.
That same month it claimed responsibility for a January 7 truck bombing at a police school in Zliten, east of Tripoli, that killed more than 50 people, the deadliest attack since the 2011 revolt.
An abridged report from AP:
The lifeless body of Yemen's top Salafi cleric in the southern port city of Aden was found disfigured on Sunday hours after he was abducted following an anti-extremism sermon, security officials told The Associated Press.
Government forces repelled Shiite rebels from Aden last July, but have been unable to restore order there ever since. With government forces now pushing north toward the rebel-held capital, Sanaa, the vacuum in Aden has given rise to affiliates of extremist groups like al-Qaida and the Islamic State group, who have grabbed lands and exercised control in various parts of the city for months.
The influential cleric, Samahan Abdel-Aziz, also known as Sheikh Rawi, had delivered a fiery sermon against the al-Qaida and IS branches on Friday, the officials said. His body was found bloodied and bearing signs of torture in Sheikh Othman, an area largely controlled by extremists, they added.
Abdel-Aziz was kidnapped by gunmen outside his mosque late Saturday in the pro-government neighborhood of Bureiqa, they said.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to talk to the media. They remain neutral in the war that has splintered the Arab world's poorest country.
An AP report:
A survivor hidden in a tree says he watched Boko Haram extremists firebomb huts and heard the screams of children burning to death, among 86 people officials say died in the latest attack by Nigeria's homegrown Islamic extremists.
Scores of charred corpses and bodies with bullet wounds littered the streets from Saturday night's attack on Dalori village and two nearby camps housing 25,000 refugees, according to survivors and soldiers at the scene just 5 kilometers (3 miles) from Maiduguri, the birthplace of Boko Haram and the biggest city in Nigeria's northeast.
The shooting, burning and explosions from three suicide bombers continued for nearly four hours in the unprotected area, survivor Alamin Bakura said, weeping on a telephone call to The Associated Press. He said several of his family members were killed or wounded.
The violence continued as three female suicide bombers blew up among people who managed to flee to neighboring Gamori village, killing many people, according to a soldier at the scene who insisted on anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to journalists.
Troops arrived at Dalori around 8:40 p.m. Saturday but were unable to overcome the attackers, who were better armed, said soldiers who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the press. The Boko Haram fighters only retreated after reinforcements arrived with heavier weapons, they said.
Journalists visited the carnage Sunday and spoke to survivors who complained it had taken too long for help to arrive from nearby Maiduguri, the military headquarters of the fight to curb Boko Haram. They said they fear another attack.
Eighty-six bodies were collected by Sunday afternoon, according to Mohammed Kanar, area coordinator of the National Emergency Management Agency. Another 62 people are being treated for burns, said Abba Musa of the State Specialist Hospital in Maiduguri.
Boko Haram has been attacking soft targets, increasingly with suicide bombers, since the military last year drove them out of towns and villages in northeastern Nigeria.
The 6-year Islamic uprising has killed about 20,000 people and driven 2.5 million from their homes.
A Reuters report:
The United States and its allied targeted Islamic State militants in Iraq with 18 strikes on Friday and five strikes in Syria, the U.S. military said on Sunday.
Four of the strikes in Iraq were near Mosul, destroying two Islamic State heavy machine guns, two fighting positions, five assembly areas, and a checkpoint, the U.S. Defense Department said in a statement.
Near Ramadi, also in Iraq, seven strikes struck three separate Islamic State tactical units, it said.
That concludes our live blogging for today. Please join us again tomorrow for more coverage.
Unfortunately, we won't be running the Tracking Islamic State blog today due to illness. Thanks for understanding.
Russia dismisses Britain's accusations that it is strengthening IS in Syria as "dangerous disinformation"
Moscow has dismissed comments by Britain's Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond that Russia's actions in Syria are undermining efforts to fight the IS group, with Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova telling a Moscow radio station this morning that Hammond's accusations were "dangerous disinformation."
"It’s a source of constant grief to me that everything we are doing is being undermined by the Russians," Hammond told Reuters during a visit to the Zaatari refugee camp in Jordan, about 10km south of the border with Syria.
"The Russians say let’s talk, and then they talk and they talk and they talk. The problem with the Russians is while they are talking they are bombing, and they are supporting Assad."
Kremlin spokesman: Britain's remarks on Russia in Syria can't be taken seriously
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has weighed in on the accusation by British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond that Russia is strengthening IS in Syria, saying that Hammond's comments were illogical, incorrect and cannot be taken seriously.
"As far as I am aware, our Foreign Ministry has already given a reaction. Of course, these remarks cannot be taken seriously. In fact, Russia is undertaking a massive, sustained effort in order, first of all, to help Syrians in the war on terror, on international terror, which poses a threat not only to Syria itself but to the whole world. Therefore, to make such a statement is illogical, it is incorrect and most of all it is contrary to the essence of the efforts that Russia is making," Peskov said according to RIA Novosti.