AMMAN, Nov 13: An Iraqi woman captured by Jordan and accused of taking part in a suicide attack confessed on television on Sunday to joining a wedding party at an Amman hotel and then unsuccessfully trying to blow herself up.
Wearing a white headscarf and an ill-fitting black coat, Sajida Mubarak Atrous al Rishawi was composed and spoke in calm voice as she told of her role in what authorities say was four-person mission targeting three hotels, an operation that killed 57 people and injured close to 100.
Ms Rishawi was arrested earlier on Sunday as Jordanian security services stepped up a campaign to nab other suspects behind the three devastating attacks that have been blamed on Al Qaeda’s Iraq front man Abu Musab al Zarqawi.
Ms Rishawi, 35, but appearing older than her years, said she and her husband entered Jordan by car on Nov 5 carrying fake Iraqi passports and made their way on Nov 9 to the Radisson SAS hotel, where a wedding was in progress.
“I took one corner and my husband took another corner. There was a wedding party at the hotel with women, men and children. My husband carried out the operation. I tried to detonate but it didn’t go, so I left.
“People came running out and I came out with them,” Mr Rishawi recalled in a calm and steady voice.
The attack at the Radisson killed the fathers of the groom and the bride.
While her husband, Ali Hussein al Shammari, also 35, blew himself up at the Radisson, their accomplices, Rawwad Jasem Mohammed Abed and Safa’ Mohammed Ali, were carrying out similar missions at two other Amman luxury hotels.—AFP
