May 14, 2003	Wednesday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 11, 1424

MOSCOW, May 13: Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday a recent spate of suicide attacks in Saudi Arabia and Chechnya bore “the same imprint” and proved the need for close cooperation in the fight against global terrorism, Interfax news agency reported.

“The imprint in this and that case is absolutely identical. The consequences are absolutely comparable,” Putin said at a meeting with Nato Secretary General George Robertson.

“The latest terrorist act in the Chechen republic and the major terrorist act in Saudi Arabia once again confirmed the primary importance of all the questions being worked on in the Russia-Nato joint council,” he told Robertson.

“Russia is ready to work with Nato not only to resolve joint tasks in the fight against terrorism but in many other areas,” the Russian president added.

A series of suicide blasts rocked three expatriate housing compounds in the Saudi capital in Riyadh on Monday night, on the eve of a visit by US Secretary of State Colin Powell.

More than 90 people, including 10 to 12 US citizens, were killed in the attacks, US State Department officials said on Tuesday.

Powell, who was due to arrive in Moscow from Riyadh late on Tuesday, said the Saudi blasts had “all the earmarks of Al Qaeda.”

A top Russian official meanwhile accused Al Qaeda of being behind a suicide attack in the breakaway republic of Chechnya early on Monday. The blast killed at least 54 people.—AFP