Obama gets reports on security failings in Detroit plot

Jan 1, 2010, 17:15 GMT

Washington - US President Barack Obama received the first results Thursday from an inquiry into how the intelligence community failed to prevent the Christmas Day attack on a US airliner over Detroit.

Obama was also given a preliminary report into beefing up airline security. Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, allegedly smuggled PETN explosives onto a December 25 flight from Amsterdam and tried to ignite the powder as the plane was descending into Detroit.

Obama said he was briefed by the White House's top homeland security adviser John Brennan as well as Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, but he offered few details of the initial findings.

'I anticipate receiving assessments from several agencies this evening and will review those tonight and over the course of the weekend,' Obama said in a statement, adding that he would hold a meeting with agency heads on Tuesday.

US investigators meanwhile were reportedly turning their attention to a US-born Yemeni cleric's ties to Abdulmutallab as part of an ongoing effort to find the plotters behind the failed attack.

Anwar al-Awlaki, who preached from a mosque in Northern Virginia before moving to Yemen in 2002, is alleged to have been part of an effort to radicalize Abdulmutallab, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing US officials.

Al-Awlaki also had contacts with an army major who opened fire in November at the US military base in Fort Hood, Texas, killing 13 people. The extent of al-Awlaki's contacts with Abdulmutallab is unclear.

Obama hopes that the preliminary inquiries will help fill some of the gaps in how the US intelligence community missed warning signs about Abdulmutallab's failed plot. A Yemen-based arm of al-Qaeda has claimed responsibility for the attempt.

The National Security Agency (NSA) knew for about four months of a possible plot, picking up chatter from al-Qaeda leaders about a Nigerian being trained for the attack in Yemen, The New York Times reported. But US agencies failed to connect the dots, most notably Abdulmutallab's father warning US officials in November that he believed his son had become radicalized.

Obama on Tuesday heavily criticized the intelligence community for failing to avert the near disaster and promised to hold people accountable. He ordered the preliminary inquiry to be completed by Thursday and a fuller investigation in the next few weeks.

'There was a mix of human and systemic failures that contributed to this potential catastrophic breach of security,' Obama said. 'We need to learn from this episode and act quickly to fix the flaws in our system, because our security is at stake and lives are at stake.'