Canada arrests terror suspects; explosives found

TORONTO, June 3 (Reuters) A group of Canadian residents inspired by al Qaeda and arrested for ''terrorism related offenses'' had amassed enough explosives to build huge bombs and were planning to blow up targets in Ontario, Canada's political and economic power center, police said today.

Mike McDonnell, assistant commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, said the group had acquired three tonnes of ammonium nitrate -- or three times the amount used in the 1995 bombing in Oklahoma City -- as they sought to ''create explosive devices.'' Police said they had arrested 12 men and five young people in coordinated raids. The adults were from Toronto, its western suburb of Mississauga and from Kingston, Ontario, at the eastern edge of Lake Ontario and not far from the border with the United States.

''This group posed a real and serious threat,'' McDonnell said.

''It had the capacity and intent to carry out attacks. Our investigation and arrests prevented the assembly of any bombs and the attacks being carried out. ... The modus operandi is very similar to other attacks that have taken place around the world and other threat of attacks.'' McDonnell said the investigation that led to the arrests had involved some 400 police and security experts, and had taken thousands of hours of painstaking detective work.

''We must remain vigilant,'' he said. ''Canada is susceptible to criminal terrorist activity as much as any other country.'' Police have charged 12 men, aged between 19 and 43, and five youngsters under the age of 18, with terrorism-related offences.

Officials said they had trained together in a camp in Canada.

''They're all residents of Canada and for the most part, they're all citizens.'' McDonell said. ''They represent the broad strata of our community. Some are students, some are employed, some are unemployed.'' INSPIRED BY AL QAEDA ''For various reasons. they appear to have become adherents of a violent ideology inspired by al Qaeda,'' said Luc Portelance, assistant director of operations at the Canadian spy service, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service.

There have been no al Qaeda-type attacks in Canada, although security services have long fretted about possible risks and the United States has urged more vigilance on the long border the two countries share.

Algerian-born Ahmed Ressam, dubbed the millennium bomber, was arrested in December 1999 as he crossed into the United States from Canada in a car carrying explosives Ressam was jailed for 22 years last year for plotting to set off a bomb at Los Angeles airport on December 31, 1999.

Police say the group arrested this weekend had received delivery of the ammonium nitrate, a commonly used fertilizer, and planned to target locations in southern Ontario, a densely populated region.

Police would not identify the targets, but media reports said they included at least one tourist site in Toronto.

CSIS admitted this week it couldn't track down many domestic terror suspects and warned the country faced an increasing threat from ''home-grown terrorists'' who had been assimilated into society.

Jack Hooper, deputy director of operations at the CSIS, said the service was trying to keep track of ''350 high-level targets'' as well as 50 to 60 organisations thought to be linked to groups such as al-Qaeda.

''We know who and where some of them are,'' he told the Senate's national defence committee on Monday in Ottawa.

REUTERS SRS RAI2152