Missile-plot sting nets 3

An FBI agent posed as a terrorist interested in buying the missile.
WASHINGTON (AP) -- A suspected arms dealer who thought he was selling a shoulder-fired missile to a Muslim terrorist bent on shooting down an airliner was actually the target of an international sting operation that resulted in three arrests, officials say.
Authorities in the United States, Britain and Russia cooperated in the investigation, which began months ago with a tip that the dealer was seeking weapons to buy in St. Petersburg, Russia, said several U.S. law enforcement officials speaking on condition of anonymity.
The probe culminated Tuesday in the arrest of an alleged British arms dealer at a hotel in Newark, N.J., where, officials said, he had flown from London to close the deal on a sophisticated Russian SA-18 Igla missile capable of bringing down commercial airliners.
The terrorist buyer turned out to be an undercover FBI agent, and the weapon was an inoperable copy brought from Russia to the United States aboard a ship to make the deal seem real, officials said.
The British suspect, who is of Indian descent, did not appear to be connected to Al-Qaida or any other known terrorist group. Authorities also stressed that there was no specific, credible threat to shoot down an airliner in the United States. But one official said the understanding between the Briton and the undercover FBI agent who agreed to purchase the weapon was that the missile needed to be capable of bringing down a commercial airliner.
Charges
Two other men, believed to be involved in money laundering, were apprehended about the same time at a gem dealership on Fifth Avenue in New York City.
All three were expected to appear today in federal court in Newark, officials said. Their names were not immediately made available because the arrests and charges were under court-ordered seal.
But two New Jersey newspapers, The Star-Ledger of Newark and The Record of Bergen County, said the British suspect would be charged with material support of terrorism and weapons smuggling.
Justice Department officials had no immediate comment on the case. The Star-Ledger, citing a law enforcement source, reported that evidence against the Briton was expected to include audio and videotapes in which he speaks favorably of Osama bin Laden and refers to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks as "a good thing."
Cooperation
The Russians passed on their tip about the reputed arms dealer's activities to the FBI, which was permitted to work inside Russia, U.S. officials said. British officials, including the MI5 domestic intelligence agency, helped track the man's whereabouts.
The investigation also involved the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Secret Service.
The chief spokesman for Russia's Federal Security Service, or FSB, the main successor of the KGB, said the operation was a result of close cooperation among the secret services of the United States, Russia and Britain, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported.
"This action marks a new stage in the development of cooperation between the special services of these countries," ITAR-Tass quoted FSB spokesman Sergei Ignatchenko as saying in Washington. He said it was the first such operation since the Cold War.
Concerns about terrorists using shoulder-fired missiles to shoot down commercial airliners increased in November when two SA-7 missiles narrowly missed an Israeli passenger jet after it took off from Mombasa, Kenya. Officials concluded that Al-Qaida probably was behind the attack, which coincided with a bomb blast at a nearby hotel.
Hundreds and perhaps thousands of shoulder-fired missiles -- heat-seeking rockets that can hit low-flying aircraft within three miles -- are said to be available on the worldwide arms market. Older missile launchers can be bought for as little as several thousand dollars.
Chechen rebels have used Igla shoulder-fired missiles against Russian military aircraft. Last week they used a missile to shoot down a Russian helicopter, killing three of the crew. And last year the rebels shot down a Russian troop-carrying helicopter, killing more than 100 people.
Anti-missile defense
The Homeland Security Department has asked U.S. high-tech companies to look into developing anti-missile technology for commercial planes. Critics in Congress say the agency is not moving quickly enough or spending enough on the project.
Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., is backing a bill introduced by Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., that calls for outfitting all of the roughly 6,800 planes in the U.S. commercial fleet with anti-missile defenses. The cost is estimated at $10 billion.
"The danger of an airliner being shot down by one of these missiles is now staring the Homeland Security Department in the face," Schumer said. "The fact that DHS is planning to take at least two years to develop a missile defense prototype to outfit the U.S. commercial fleet verges on the dangerous."
Meantime, the United States has sent experts to domestic airports as well as to airports in Iraq and major capitals in Europe and Asia to assess security. The investigators are trying to determine whether the airports can be defended against shoulder-fired missiles.
World leaders meeting in Evian, France, in June acknowledged the threat posed by shoulder-fired missiles and adopted a plan to restrict sales of the weapons.
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