Afghans say they net al Qaeda plotters in Kabul raid

KABUL, Sep 19 (Reuters) Afghan police have arrested four al Qaeda-linked militants and seized more than a dozen bombs that were to have been used against the government and foreign forces in Kabul, police said today.

Afghanistan is undergoing its worst phase of violence since 2001 with Taliban insurgents battling foreign and government troops in parts of the countryside, and a series of blasts in towns and cities.

All four of the suspects were Afghan, senior police official Ali Shah Paktiawal told Reuters Three of them, two Muslim preachers and a Kabul University student, were arrested in a raid on a Kabul mosque yesterday. A fourth suspect was seized today.

''We discovered more than 15 bombs hidden in the mosque,'' said Paktiawal.

''They have confessed to having direct links with al Qaeda and were talking of using them against the government and foreign forces as part of their jihad (holy war),'' he said.

The Taliban were ousted in 2001 for refusing to hand over al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. The two groups are believed to work closely together.

Paktiawal said the bombs found at the mosque were highly sophisticated and must have come from overseas.

He said the suspects were part of a bigger al Qaeda network operating in Kabul and the hunt was on for other members.

About 2,500 people, most of them militants, according to foreign forces, have been killed in Afghan violence since January.

Nineteen people, including four Canadian soldiers and eight Afghan policemen, were killed in three blasts yesterday, in the southern province of Kandahar, the western city of Herat and Kabul.

The level of violence, in which more than 130 foreign troops have also been killed, has alarmed Afghanistan's Western allies that had regarded the country as a success in the war on terrorism.

REUTERS DKA RK1728