NY Stock Exchange also his target, He wants to ‘destroy America’
US officials arrested a Bangladeshi man on Wednesday on charges of plotting to blow up the Federal Reserve building, housing the US central banking organisation, in Manhattan of New York, just blocks from the World Trade Center site.
The FBI said Quazi Mohammad Rezwanul Ahsan Nafis, 21, travelled to the US in January of 2012 with the intent of planning a terrorist attack, reports BBC Online.
Nafis was arrested Wednesday morning after he parked a van filled with what he believed were explosives outside the building and tried to detonate it in a suicide mission, authorities said.
He allegedly attempted to detonate what he thought was a 1,000lb (454kg) bomb.
The Bangladeshi native reported having overseas connections to al-Qaeda, and travelled to the US in January to carry out an attack, according to a complaint filed in federal court in Brooklyn, reports AP.
He also recorded a videotaped statement in which he said, “We will not stop until we attain victory or martyrdom,” federal prosecutors said.
Authorities said Nafis proposed several spots for his attack, including the New York Stock Exchange – and that in a written letter taking responsibility for the Federal Reserve job he was about to carry out, he said he wanted to “destroy America.”
He was trying to recruit people, but one was a secret FBI source, and Nafis was closely monitored as he tried to act out his plot.
There was never a threat, the FBI said, as Nafis had been closely watched.
One of the people he contacted turned out to be a source working for the FBI, US federal prosecutors said.
Nafis was placed under surveillance, and the undercover FBI agent sold him 20 bags of what he thought were 50lb of explosives. The suspect then bought and assembled detonators and timing devices.
Officials said there had never been any actual threat.
The arrest is the latest in a series of so-called sting operations run by the FBI and anti-terror authorities in the US.
Nafis was awaiting a federal court hearing later Wednesday where he is facing a charge of attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction and attempting to provide material support for al-Qaida.
Nafis was living in Queens. It’s not clear if he had a lawyer yet.
The Federal Reserve Bank in New York, located at 33 Liberty Street, is one of 12 branches around the country that, along with the Board of Governors in Washington, make up the Federal Reserve System that serves as the central bank of the United States. It sets interest rates.
Source: The Daily Star
