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Three French killed in Saudi Arabia
2007-02-26
Three French expatriates in Saudi Arabia were shot dead in an attack Monday near the historical site of Madain Saleh in northwestern Saudi Arabia, a French diplomatic source said. An unknown number of attackers "machine-gunned them when they got out (of their vehicle) to take some air," the source said. Two others were wounded and were in "serious condition," the diplomat said requesting anonymity, adding that the victims were part of a group that had travelled from Riyadh. French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy was quick to condemn the attack as a "horrible act". "French authorities have mobilised alongside Saudi authorities so that full light is shed and that the perpetrators are arrested and punished," he added. The Saudi interior ministry confirmed the attack and the death toll, saying that the victims were shot dead by gunmen in an unidentified vehicle. "A group of French residents including four men, three women and two children came under fire from an unidentified car while on their way back from a trip and as they stopped in a desert area for rest," the ministry said in a statement carried by SPA state news agency. It said the attack happened on the road between the Muslim holy city of Medina and the northwestern city of Tabuk. The ministry said that some members of the group were planning to head towards the holy city of Mecca to perform the lesser pilgrimage or Umra, meaning that some of them were Muslims. "It appeared that two men were killed instantly. Two others were wounded (but) one of them died in hospital," it added. Madain Saleh is a popular destination for Western expatriates living in the oil-rich kingdom. The attack is the first to target Western expatriates since a Briton was wounded in a knife attack in November in the eastern industrial city of Jubail. Westerners were repeatedly targeted after suspected Al-Qaeda militants launched a string of shootings and bombings in the Gulf monarchy in May 2003. Laurent Barbot, a 45-year-old French engineer who worked for electronics group Thales in Jeddah, was shot dead in September 2004. The same month, a British national was killed in a shooting in Riyadh. He worked for telecommunications company Marconi, which advises the Saudi national guard. The attacks subsided after security forces launched a relentless crackdown on suspected sympathisers of Al-Qaeda, in the ultra-conservative Muslim kingdom, homeland of the network's fugitive leader Osama bin Laden. But gunfights between security forces and militants continue despite periods of calm. In December, gunmen killed two policemen in the centre of the Saudi commercial capital of Jeddah before escaping through a security cordon thrown up around their hideout. In December 2004, suspected Al-Qaeda gunmen stormed the US consulate in Jeddah, triggering a bloody three-hour siege and a shootout that left five staff and four attackers dead. The interior ministry had announced early December that it had detained 136 Al-Qaeda suspects, mostly Saudi nationals, in raids over the past three months. Saudi Arabia announced in February 2006 it had thwarted a bid to blow up an oil processing plant, the world's largest, at Abqaiq in the Eastern Province, and US officials said last October they feared possible attacks on oil installations in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries.
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