Sweden bomb suspect arrested in UK

Two people were injured and the bomber killed in a botched attack apparently targeting Stockholm shoppers [AFP]

Scottish police have arrested a 30-year-old man in connection with a botched suicide bombing in Stockholm, the Swedish capital, last December.

The man, said to be a foreign national, was detained following a dawn raid in Glasgow, Scotland, on Tuesday.

A police statement said the arrest “relates to allegations that this individual has been involved in aiding terrorism activities outside Scotland”, but added there was “no evidence” to suggest he posed a risk to Scotland.

Taimour Abdulwahab al Abdaly, an Iraqi-born Swedish national, blew himself up and injured two others in an apparent attempt to target Christmas shoppers in downtown Stockholm on December 11, 2010.

It is believed he was intent on attacking a train station or department store, but the explosives he was wearing detonated prematurely.

In January, the director of Iraq’s anti-terrorism unit said al Abdaly, who lived in Sweden in the 1990s, had received explosives training in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul.

Investigators into the bombing had been studying a link to Britain, after it emerged that the attacker studied sports therapy at the University of Bedfordshire in Luton, Britain, where he graduated in 2004.

Days after the attack British police searched a property in southeast England, thought to be where 29-year-old al Abdaly had lived with his wife and three children, but no arrests were made.

Swedish investigators, who previously said they were looking for a second or third person who could have helped al Abdaly, reported that they had co-operated with Scottish police in the probe.

“The arrest in Scotland is a result of the Scottish police investigation and a co-operation between Scotland and Sweden within the framework for international legal assistance, as well as a good cooperation between prosecutors and the police authorities,” Sapo, the Swedish intelligence agency, said in a statement.

“The investigation so far shows that there may be a connection between the arrested person and the terror crime in Stockholm on December 11, something the continued investigative work in Scotland will have to show,” it added.