The pair, en route from
Chicago to Yemen, were detained on Monday and a decision on bringing
charges is to be made in the next few days, the Dutch prosecution
service said."The men are being held in custody on suspicion of
conspiracy to commit a terrorist criminal act," the prosecution service
said in a statement.The Yemenis arrived in Amsterdam from Chicago
O'Hare airport on United flight 908 early on Monday and were detained on
the plane after the US Department of Homeland Security alerted Dutch
authorities to suspicious items found in their luggage in the United
States.These included mobile phones found taped together, and one
phone taped to a plastic bottle. The phones were seized in the United
States.ABC News cited officials as saying three large knives were
found in the men's luggage and that one of them was carrying $7,000 in
cash.The circumstances of the security alert have prompted some
security experts to suggest the men -- identified by a US law
enforcement official as Ahmed Mohamed Nasser Al Soofi and Hezam Al
Murisi -- could have been conducting a test run for a planned terrorist
attack.Although suspicious items were found in the checked luggage
of the two men, the items were not prohibited and were not considered
dangerous and the men were therefore allowed to fly.But US media has
reported that Al Soofi, who had been booked on a flight to Washington
Dulles International Airport, later boarded the Amsterdam-bound flight
without his luggage instead, prompting US authorities to alert Dutch
authorities.White House spokesman Robert Gibbs told CNN the men were
involved in a series of "suspicious events" and that authorities would
conduct a "vigorous investigation.""They were not on any of the
terror watch lists ... They went through some extra screening. Their
bags were pulled off of a flight because they were not on that flight,"
Gibbs said."Extra precautions were taken ... and now obviously the next step is getting some answers.""As far as we know security has not been jeopardized," a spokeswoman with the Dutch counter-terrorism agency NCTb said.She
said Dutch authorities were in contact with the United States and that
the matter was being taken very seriously. A lot of details still needed
to be clarified, she said.Edwin Bakker, head of the security and
conflict program of the Netherlands Institute of International
Relations, said the combination of factors, including the luggage and
the money, was very suspicious and could indicate it had been a test
run."If this is a dry run, it is always bad news ... but it's good
to see that counter-terrorism measures appear to work," he said. "This
looks like a very controlled operation and that authorities were very
alert with a lot of cooperation."Klaas-Arjen Krikke, a lawyer representing one of the men, criticized the information being released about the incident."My client has already been condemned by a large section of the public via the media," Krikke told agency ANP.Passenger
footage aired by Dutch commercial broadcaster RTL showed police
escorting the handcuffed men out of the plane as passengers watched from
their seats.The arrests revived memories of an alleged attempted bombing last Christmas on a flight from Amsterdam to Detroit.Suspect
Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab is charged with trying to blow up a Delta Air
Lines flight as it approached Detroit with an explosive device hidden
in his underwear.