RIYADH, May 20: A senior Saudi official said on Monday he believed the suicide bombers who struck Riyadh last week were planning a much bigger operation and he feared another devastating attack.

“My gut feeling tells me that something big is going to happen here or in America,” Prince Bandar bin Sultan, Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to Washington, told foreign journalists on Monday night.

He said he believed there were around 50 hardcore extremist militants in Saudi Arabia.

Thirty-four people, including eight Americans, died in the triple suicide bombings of foreign residential compounds. It was the first time civilians had been targeted indiscriminately in the country.

“I think they were looking to do something more major than this,” Prince Bandar said.

Prince Bandar said US and Saudi intelligence were picking up “a high level of (electronic) chatter, regionally and in other international spots”, which could indicate that something else was being planned. All monitored chatter had suddenly stopped two or three days before the attacks, he added.

“I’m confident we’ll get them in the end. But the question is, will it be early enough or not?” he said. Egyptian militant Saif al-Adel, believed to be al Qaeda’s new military commander, may have masterminded the Riyadh attacks, he added.

Prince Bandar dismissed a US media report alleging that soldiers in the National Guard had sold weapons to members of the Al Qaeda network, blamed for the attacks. The guns and explosives used in the bombings were Soviet-made, while all the materials used by the Saudi military were western, he said.

Saudi sources described the threat of further attacks in the United States or Saudi Arabia as “very serious”.

Prince Bandar said that 377kgs of explosives was discovered at a safe house raided near one of the compounds a week before the attacks. The Interior Ministry said at the time it was hunting 19 men in connection with the weapons cache.

“That would have taken out two blocks in the city if it had gone off accidentally. We’re all wondering if it’s the last (of the explosives) or is it the tip of the iceberg?” he said.

The uncovering of the cache when men in the safe house discovered they were under surveillance and fled could have hastened the attacks, and also limited them in size, he added.

Saudi sources said that after the bust, one Al Qaeda cell operating in the country fled to Europe or the United States. A second cell launched the suicide bombings, while a third cell was believed to still be at large.

Stung by US accusations of not doing enough to prevent the attacks, Saudi officials have acknowledged security lapses and pledged to hunt down those responsible for the bombings.

The Interior Ministry said on Saturday it had detained four Al Qaeda suspects who had prior knowledge of the attacks.—Reuters