National security adviser Condoleezza Rice said "people should stop speculating" about media reports that US forces were closing in obl. "I think it's really not backed up by sound intelligence," she told NBC television.

the al-Qaeda spokesman, Abu Dujan Al-Afgani, said the attack was an "an answer to your co-operation with the Bush criminals and their allies . . .
"If you do not stop your injustices, more blood will flow and these attacks are very little compared to what could happen with what you call terrorism."
Afgani said the bombings had come exactly 2 years after the September 11 attacks.

The shift was reinforced by the weekend arrest of five people, including three Moroccans, believed to be linked to Islamic terrorist groups. All have been linked to the sale of a mobile phone and SIM card found in a backpack bomb that failed to detonate on Thursday.