Obama blames Qaeda affiliate for airliner attack

United States President Barack Obama Saturday for the first time accused an al-Qaeda affiliate in Yemen of arming and training a young Nigerian man for a thwarted suicide mission to blow up a U.S. airliner.

Obama, in his weekly radio and video address posted on the White House website, promised to hold the group, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, to account for the attack, declaring the United States was at war with a "far-reaching network of violence and hatred."

"We know that he traveled to Yemen, a country grappling with crushing poverty and deadly insurgencies," Obama said, referring to the suspect Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab.

"It appears that he joined an affiliate of al-Qaeda, and that this group al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula-trained him, equipped him with those explosives and directed him to attack that plane headed for America."

Previously, U.S. officials have not said publicly that the Northwest attack was the work of Al-Qaeda, though had noted there was a "linkage" with the terror group.

The Arabian peninsula franchise of al-Qaeda had on Monday claimed the failed December 25 bombing of a jet in a statement picked up by U.S. monitors.

Abdulmutallab is accused of trying to blow up the plane as it approached Detroit on a flight from Amsterdam, by setting off explosives stitched into his underwear. The attempt failed when he was stopped by passengers.

Obama said that because of past attacks by the al-Qaeda affiliate he had, even before the Christmas Day attempt, stepped up U.S. cooperation with insurgency-scarred Yemen.

"Training camps have been struck; leaders eliminated; plots disrupted," he said in the address.

"And all those involved in the attempted act of terrorism on Christmas must know-you too will be held to account."

Obama also put the Northwest attack in the context of the wider threat from terrorism, following complaints from some Republicans that he has not adopted the "war on terrorism" formulation of his predecessor George W. Bush.

We know that he traveled to Yemen, a country grappling with crushing poverty and deadly insurgencies

U.S. President Barack Obama

One year

He noted that it was almost a year since he came to office and delivered his inaugural address.

"On that day I also made it very clear-our nation is at war against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred, and that we will do whatever it takes to defeat them and defend our country, even as we uphold the values that have always distinguished America among nations. "

On Thursday, the U.S. director of national intelligence, Dennis Blair, warned his staff that al-Qaeda attacks were sure to get more "cunning.

"Al-Qaeda and its affiliate organizations, as well as individual suicide terrorists, have observed our defenses and are designing future attacks to circumvent them.

"These attacks will be even harder to uncover, interpret, and stop."

In between recreational activities with his family and friends on Friday, Obama consulted top national security advisors to discuss two reviews of the thwarted bid to bomb the jet.

He spoke to National Security Council chief of staff Denis McDonough and his top anti-terror advisor John Brennan, a White House official said on condition of anonymity.

Angered by how narrowly tragedy was averted in a country still scarred by the September 11, 2001 attacks, Obama was to spend the weekend poring over the preliminary reports of two probes he demanded into the Christmas Day attack.

The president plans to meet heads of intelligence agencies and relevant government departments Tuesday in Washington to discuss the findings.

U.S. intelligence and counterterrorism officials, speaking this week on condition of anonymity, said spy agencies picked up important information about Abdulmutallab, and about the intentions of al Qaeda leaders in Yemen, in the months before the attempted bombing.

The intelligence trail began at least four months ago, when the U.S. National Security Agency intercepted communications between al Qaeda leaders in Yemen discussing the possibility of using a "Nigerian" bomber, according to one official briefed on the intelligence.

The CIA first learned of Abdulmutallab in November, when his father came to the U.S. Embassy in Nigeria and sought help in finding him, a spokesman said.

The agency said it then worked with the embassy to add Abdulmutallab and his possible Yemeni contacts to the U.S. terrorism database and forwarded biographical information about him to the National Counterterrorism Center.

Although worrying, a U.S. intelligence official said, the information the CIA received about Abdulmutallab was sketchy.

On that day I also made it very clear-our nation is at war against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred, and that we will do whatever it takes to defeat them and defend our country, even as we uphold the values that have always distinguished America among nations

Obama