Suspect's confession led to finding of bomb ingredients

Some 200 police raided a building in Samut Sakhon Monday, believed to be the storage depot of the detained terror suspect with an alleged link to the Lebanese Shiite Hezbollah militant group, and found potential bomb ingredients including fertilisers and liquid ammonium nitrate.

Police Chief Gen Priewphan Damapong said the suspect, Hussein Atris, who was arrested at Suvarnabhumi Airport, confessed about the storage unit in Muang district and led police to the building where he guided them throughout the search.

He quoted Hussein as saying that the three-storey building on Rama II Road was used to stock ingredients for explosives but that his network has never had any intention of attacking Thailand.

Among the ingredients found on the second floor of the building, which had been rented for about a year, were 4,380 kilogrammes of fertilisers in 337 boxes and 260 litres of liquid ammonium nitrate. Also confiscated were slippers and 400 electric fans packed in boxes.

"The suspect said the substances were usually shipped out of the country hidden in electric fan boxes," Priewphan said.

"The suspect asked me to tell Thai people not to worry because there would definitely be no terrorism attack in Thailand," he said.

Hussein, 47, was detained as he was about to board a flight out of Thailand on Friday in connection with a plan to attack tourist sites in Bangkok. The arrest was made after US Embassy in Thailand issued an alert to its citizens about possible terrorism attacks.

Police have released a sketch of the second suspect who is still at large.