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Monday, Dec. 6, 2004

Saudi security officials said four of its forces died in the clash, and the Interior Ministry said three of the five attackers were killed. The other two were injured and captured. Five members of the consulate's non-American staff died, according to the U.S. Embassy.

Several Americans were slightly injured, according to a State Department official in Washington.

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In Riyadh, U.S. Embassy spokeswoman Carol Kalin said that two staff members were injured but that all American staff were safe.

"We have accounted for all Americans on the compound in Jiddah, and none of them are being held hostage," Kalin said. "We have a local work force that was on duty, and we are still in the process of accounting for [them]."

Kalin said it was unclear if any of the U.S. Marine guards inside the consulate were involved in the gun battle.

As a precaution, she said, the U.S. Embassy in Riyadh and consulate in Dhahran were closed to the public.

The attackers apparently made their way past Saudi security personnel into the interior of the diplomatic compound, the State Department official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

"All the Americans at the consulate were able to reach secure locations" at the compound, he said, describing the injuries to the Americans as minor.

Saudi security forces, including snipers, could be seen on the rooftops of buildings around the consulate compound. Thick smoke rose from the compound and helicopters hovered overhead.

The statement by a Saudi Interior Ministry spokesman, carried by the official Saudi Press Agency, said a "stray bunch," a reference to Islamic militants, threw explosives at the gate of the consulate, then entered. Saudi security forces engaged the attackers, "killing three aggressors, and two were captured after they were hit," the statement said.

"The situation was brought under control," the statement said. It gave no further details.

The White House closely monitored the situation in Jiddah as President Bush prepared to meet with two Middle East leaders: Ghazi al-Yawer, the interim president of Iraq, and Jordan's King Abdullah II.

A senior Saudi official in Washington, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said that the attackers took several hostages, mostly Sudanese and Indian, but that the Americans were evacuated.

During the hostage standoff, the official said, there were negotiations, but Saudi security forces stormed the attackers when threats were made. There was a brief firefight that ended with the three being killed and two captured, the Saudi official said.

Security forces freed the hostages, the official said.

Area residents spoke of seeing Saudi forces enter the consulate shortly before a fierce gun battle was heard inside. A short time later, the gunfire stopped.

Saudi security officials said two security guards at the gate of consulate were wounded, one of them seriously, after the attackers opened fire on them before entering the mission.

A Saudi health official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said several people were injured and taken to a hospital.

Witnesses initially said they saw the attackers' car explode outside the consulate, located in the city's heart near the Red Sea, but it was not immediately clear if a car bomb had been used or if the attackers had thrown explosives after driving the car up to the consulate.

Saudi security officials said the assailants shot at security guards at the consulate's gate, set off an explosion, using either a car bomb or grenades, and got into the compound. There, they said Saudi security guards engaged the attackers, but the attackers managed to seize hostages.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility. But Saudi officials have blamed al-Qaida operatives for the string of attacks that have hit the kingdom in the past two years.

On Islamic militant Web sites, contributors began hailing the attack even before it was over, with one person praising it as "destruction of a bastion of atheism."

"We were afraid about our brothers in the Arab peninsula, but this proves that they are well and sound, thank God," said the person who made the posting, referring to recent Saudi crackdowns on militants.

Al-Arabiya satellite television reported the attackers were believed to be carrying machine guns and hand grenades that were thought to have started a fire inside the compound. The fire was extinguished by helicopter, the report said.

"The magnitude of this assault on the consulate has taken all Jiddah residents by surprise," said Khaled al-Maeena, the editor of Arab News located in Jiddah who saw the smoke rising from the compound.

The building, like all U.S. diplomatic buildings and other Western compounds in Saudi Arabia, has been heavily fortified and guarded since last year's series of bombings against targets housing foreigners.

The series of attacks started in 2003, when car bombs targeted three compounds housing foreign workers in Riyadh, killing 35 people, including nine suicide bombers. Later that year, a suicide car bomb killed 17 people and wounded 122 at a compound for foreign workers in Riyadh.

Last May, 22 people were killed, including 19 foreigners, by militants who took over a resort complex in Khobar and held hostages for 25 hours. In another attack that month, militants stormed offices of Houston-based ABB Lummus Global Inc. in Yanbu, killing six Westerners and a Saudi. All four attackers in Yanbu died in a shootout after an hour-long police chase in which they dragged the body of an American from the bumper of their car.

In June, militants in Riyadh, the capital, kidnapped and beheaded Paul M. Johnson Jr., an engineer for a U.S. defense company.

© 2004 Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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