RIYADH, Aug 5: One of the six Saudi militants killed in a July 28 shootout was a member of the 19-strong “terrorist” cell wanted in connection with the May 12 Riyadh blasts that left 35 dead, the government said Tuesday.

“Ahmed bin Nasir Abdullah al-Dakhil, a Saudi national, is one of the 19 most wanted persons,” an interior ministry official said in a statement carried by the official SPA news agency.

The ministry official named the others killed as Saudi nationals Karim Olayan al-Ramthan al-Faridi al-Harbi, Saud Amer Suleiman al-Qurashi and Mohammed Ghazi Salim al-Wafi al-Harbi, along with Isa Kamal Yusuf Khater and Isa Saleh Ali Ahmed, both from Chad.

The raid on the farm in the northern province of Qassim, which also left two Saudi policemen dead, netted security forces a cache of weapons that included 10 machine guns, pistols, hundreds of bullets, home-made bombs, mobile phones, tape players and a set of women’s dresses.

“There is no choice for them but to surrender and face trial,” the official said in a message to the remaining fugitives.

“All those who harbour and cover up or sympathise with the wanted persons would also face the suitable punishment,” he warned.

Saudi leaders have vowed to clamp down on terror suspects, their ideologists and supporters in a bid to rid the conservative Muslim nation of terrorism.

Since the May 12 suicide bom bings of Western residential compounds in Riyadh that left 35 people dead, including several bombers, Saudi Arabia has arrested 144 people with suspected ties to terrorism.

This is in addition to more than 300 arrests of terror suspects following the September 11, 2001, attacks in the United States blamed on Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda network.—AFP