Al-Qaeda bombmaker Ibrahim Hassan al-Asiri planning to insert explosives into cats and dogs

By nardibynature 

From the same twisted mind that brought the underwear bomb into public consciousness comes a possible plot to rig other items - including pets - with explosives.

On the heels of revelations that al-Qaeda was preparing to strike on the anniversary of Osama bin Laden’s death come new reports about more bold plans from the notorious terror group.

ABC News reported that Ibrahim Hassan al-Asiri, al-Qaeda's chief bombmaker who is believed to be behind both underwear bomb plots, was working on new explosives that they hoped would pass an airport security screening.

U.S. authorities told the network that al-Asiri's latest projects involve bombs surgically placed inside terrorists and devices similarly implanted in pets that could be carried on planes.

Al-Asiri was also hoping to rig computer supplies like external hard drives and cameras with bomb components

Seth Jones, former senior adviser to the U.S. Special Operations Command and author of Hunting in the Shadows: The Pursuit of al Qa'ida since 9/11, told ABC: '[Al-Asiri] is very innovative in trying to find some way to get a bomb onto an airplane that will evade detection from airport screeners.'

The new underwear bomb plot was discovered this week after a double agent working for both U.S. and Saudi intelligence was placed inside Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) where he convinced his handlers to give him the ‘undetectable’ bomb.

The agent, who was in Yemen, was liaising with the CIA before handing the device over to intelligence services.

Experts at the FBI's bomb laboratory in Quantico, Virginia, are now analysing the device to see if it could have gotten through airport security.

It did not contain metal, meaning it probably could have at least passed through an airport metal detector.

But it is not yet clear whether new body scanners used in many airports would have detected it.

If such a device could be smuggled through, it could in theory be detonated before passengers or crew knew it was on board.

It appeared to be an upgraded version of the underwear bomb that failed to down a passenger jet over Detroit on Christmas Day 2009.

In that plot, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab flew from Lagos to Amsterdam, then boarded Northwest Airlines Flight 253 to Detroit, which was carrying 279 passengers and 11 crew.

Hours into the flight, he tried to detonate the explosives by injecting chemicals into them.

He suffered severe burns when the bomb failed to explode, and was overpowered by passengers and crew.
Disturbingly, the bomb was not picked up in airport security checks in Lagos and Amsterdam.

Now serving a life prison sentence in the United States, Abdulmutallab is certain to be questioned again about his bomb, its maker and those who supplied it.

Al-Asiri is also believed to have been behind the bombs hidden in printer cartridges aboard two cargo flights bound for the U.S. in 2010.
SOURCE