The two assailants who attacked US marines in Kuwait may have been trained by al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and were believed to have relatives in custody at the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, a US defense official claimed today.
But the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the attack appeared to have been planned locally rather than by al-Qaeda.
Kuwaiti authorities are seeking a local cleric in connection with yesterday's attack, and as many as four suspected co-conspirators are in Kuwaiti custody, the official said.
The marines were taking part in a training exercise on Kuwait's Failaka island when they came under fire by two assailants who rode up in a pickup truck.
One marine was killed and another wounded.
The Pentagon identified the marine who was killed as Lance Corporal Antonio Sledd of Hillsborough, Florida. The wounded marine has not been identified.
The assailants were shot and killed after they fired on a second group of marines some distance away, officials said.
"We believe there is a possibility that they received al-Qaeda training in Afghanistan," the official said.
"As to whether it was al-Qaeda planned or locally planned, we think it was locally planned using al-Qaeda training," the official added.
Kuwait's interior ministry today identified the two assailants, who were shot and killed in the incident, as Anas Ahmad Ibrahim al-Kandari, 21, and Jassem Hamad Mubarak al-Hajeri, 26.
"We believe they had some relatives in Gitmo," the US defense official said, referring to military slang for the US naval station at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where the United States is holding hundreds of prisoners from the Afghan campaign.
AFP