Letter bomb not from al-Qaeda

Joint regional intelligence authorities yesterday dissociated the al-Qaeda terror network from the letter bomb which was delivered to and defused at the Myanmar Embassy in Makati City Friday.

Sources told The STAR that the letter bomb that was delivered and subsequently defused by the Makati City police bomb experts at the embassy last Friday was among the letter bombs sent by Burmese rebels to the Myanmar’s embassies abroad.

"No, neither al Qaeda nor the Jemayah Islamiya had anything to do with the letter bomb delivered by the Burmese rebels to the Myanmar Embassy in Makati City," foreign and local sources said.

Instead, sources claimed that the letter bomb originated from the Karen rebel movement which has long been fighting the Myanmar military government.

Bearing a Thai postmark, the letter bomb delivered to the embassy in Makati City was the same type of bomb the rebels previously sent to their embassies in China, Malaysia, Japan and Singapore.

"Pan-lima na itong sa Makati dahil may na-recover na rin sa mga embassies doon. Walang kinalaman dito and mga terrorist groups," sources told The STAR.

Inside the envelope was an electronic greeting card that normally plays music. It was rigged with an extra battery to ignite a powerful blasting cap, which is normally used to detonate larger bombs.

Myanmar’s military government in Yangon earlier blamed anti-government groups based in Thailand for mailing letter bombs to embassies last month.

The letters sent to Tokyo and Singapore contained bombs, said Lt. Col. Nyan Lin, a senior intelligence officer, and the letter to Kuala Lumpur carried a message about pro-democracy demonstrations that shook Myanmar in 1988.

The protests were violently quashed by the military, which set up a junta that still rules the country. – Jaime Laude