By REUTERS
September 14, 2001
BRUSSELS/AMSTERDAM Sept 14 (Reuters) - Police in Belgium and the Netherlands arrested six suspected Islamic extremists in a joint swoop on a network thought to be planning attacks on U.S. targets in Europe, authorities said on Friday.
Two of the men were arrested on Thursday in Brussels and police found two Uzi machine pistols during a house search, a spokeswoman for the Brussels Public Prosecutor's Office said.
The other four were arrested in the Dutch port city of Rotterdam on Thursday night, Dutch prosecutor's spokesman Wim de Bruijn said.
He said there was no connection with Tuesday's terror attacks in the United States, in which intelligence officials have said fugitive Saudi-born Islamic guerrilla chieftain Osama bin Laden is the number one suspect.
Germany released on Friday an airport worker held for 24 hours in connection with the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington. German investigators were continuing a probe into Hamburg-based extremists allegedly involved.
De Bruijn would not say whether the men held in the Netherlands were armed or whether they had anything suspicious in their possession. Asked whether the Dutch authorities were in contact with the Federal Bureau of Investigation or other U.S. agencies, he said: ``I am unable to answer that.''
The identities and nationalities of the suspects were not disclosed. Two other men were detained in Brussels with the two suspects but were later released.
``Those four persons (detained in Brussels) all belong to a radical Islamic movement,'' Belgian spokeswoman Beatrice Behets said. Police also seized documents which are now being analysed, she added.
The arrests followed a tipoff from the Belgian State Security Service that one of the suspects might be preparing attacks on U.S. targets in Europe, Behets said.
A spokesman for the Belgian State Security Service would only say that the information from the Public Prosecutor's Office ``was not wrong,'' but declined to give further details.